


vanishing point

by ZephyrEden



Series: Vanishing Point [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Psychological Horror, Rating May Change, There's something in the woods, add tags as need be, cosmic horror, descriptions of harm and violence, i know the tags are p rough but it shouldn't be that bad probably?, small town, sorry to anyone on the server that’s reading about the au in the channel, spooky vibes, these aren’t the same thing there are just a handful of related plot points or details, vanishing point au, you know how small towns are
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-06-13 04:32:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15356316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZephyrEden/pseuds/ZephyrEden
Summary: van·ish·ing point/ˈvaniSHiNG ˌpoint/[noun]1. the point at which receding parallel lines viewed in perspective appear to converge.2. the point at which something that has been growing smaller or increasingly faint disappears altogether."There's the square, there's that dried up well, there's the graveyard, and that," Riku points, his tone dropping into something more serious, "is where the tracks are."Sora follows the line of his finger to the center of an endless cluster of trees a little ways from town. He squints in confusion. "But the tracks... the tracks are in a clearing.""I know. So how come we can see it when we're down there, but not when we're up here?"





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> the vanishing point au is a collaborative effort of the soriku hours discord server. the au was originally started by niku, whose twitter you can find [here.](http://twitter.com/nikutsune) however, if you're familiar with the au from the server please note that the version presented in this fic diverges greatly from what the au is now. thank you.

“Sora, come on, let’s just go home. We’ll come back tomorrow.”

“But I wanna see it now!” Sora whines. His fingers spread apart the leaves on the bush they’re hiding behind, his head shoved halfway through despite the small branches scratching at his face. He has to make sure he has a good view. “Plus, Wakka told me that the coins get super cool and pancaked when they get run over.”

“That’s why you were lining the track with pennies?” Riku sighs and stands up, now visible without the cover of foliage. He looks up to the sky, the blue long replaced by the deep violets and reds that come with sunset. “Last time we got home after dark we couldn’t see each other for a week.”

Sora jolts at that. It was the worst week he’s ever had to endure in his short life. Still, though… “I wanna see the train,” he says with conviction.

Riku shakes his head, turning away to leave. “It’s not gonna come if you’re watching. It never does.”

“Well it can’t just not come!” Sora huffs. He jumps up when he notices Riku leaving. He runs after him, reaching out to grab his arm. “Hey, wait-“

The ground shakes. The sound of the train on the tracks, right behind them.

They whip around to look, but there’s no train. With wide eyes they rush to the tracks.

The line of pennies are all flattened. There’s a girl on the ground.

“Whoa!” Sora yells, stuffing the pennies in his pocket before he goes to hover over the girl. “Hey, are you okay? Are you awake?”

Riku sees a shadow out of the corner of his eye, but when he looks at the woods there’s nothing there. There’s a chill creeping up his spine. He pretends he’s brave enough to ignore it. “Come on, Sora,” he says a bit too quickly, rushing over to the girl and grunting as he lifts one of her arms over his shoulders. “Help me carry her back to town.”

Sora nods rapidly and takes her other arm. They apologize for dragging her feet as they start the long walk back to Destiny Forge.

 

~

 

Sora breathes heavily through his nose, grinding his teeth as he carries the heavy cardboard box up the slope. His boots sink into the moist soil, slowing his progress up what feels like a mountain, and he swears under his breath, just like he does every other time this happens, that next time they can pick up their own packages if they’re going to order stuff that weighs more than he does.

He’s sweating so much as he treks up the hill that it’s the thought of peeling off his jacket that makes his body pick up the pace, eager for that small promise of relief. He digs his feet in and propels himself up in larger strides and he wants to collapse the moment he feels the earth leveling out into a plateau. He’s about to just drop the box in the dirt, but his mind blips out when he looks ahead.

Riku swings the axe in his hands down in a clean arc that speaks of practiced proficiency. The log settled on the stump in front of him splits cleanly down the middle and he tosses the pieces into a pile of similar halves, the wood landing on top of the jacket that’s carelessly thrown in with the pile, before grabbing another log to chop. He’s lifting the axe again when he takes notice of the brunette a few yards away.

“Oh, Sora,” he swings the axe down into the stump, the corner of the blade sticking firmly in the wood and leaving the handle up in easy reach. He slicks back his sweat damp bangs, lifting the hem of his shirt to wipe off the moisture from his face. “Didn’t hear you come up. Not yelling for once?” he teases.

Sora’s eyes linger on the muscled arms of his best friend before flickering over to his exposed abdomen. He turns his head away, hoping the red isn’t noticeable enough from there. “I don’t yell,” he huffs. “And come take this already, it’s heavy! What did you guys order, a box of cement?!” he yells in irritation.

Riku drops his shirt and chuckles, making his way over to Sora. He takes the box from him with relative ease, but his brows raise in surprise. “Whoa, I’m surprised you were actually able to get this up here.”

“Hey, I’m strong, too!” Sora protests despite the fact that his arms are now hanging limply at his sides like wet spaghetti. He wearily follows Riku to the house’s wraparound porch, tugging his fleece lined jacket and hat off and collapsing in his favorite rocking chair. “Seriously, though. What the hell did you guys order? A box of hammers?”

Riku snorts, rolling his eyes as he take a seat on stool and drops the box with a heavy thump in front of him. He pulls a pocket knife from his pocket and flicks it open, slicing the box clean open. Sora leans forward to get a better look as Riku folds the flaps back and he can feel the disbelief clear on his face as he looks at the contents. “Rocks. You ordered a box of rocks.”

Picking up one of the rectangle blocks, Riku looks it over before holding it up to Sora. “Not rocks. Whetstones.”

“It has stone in the name! That’s the same thing!” Sora cries, slumping back in the chair and sliding down slightly as his heel rocks him back and forth. “I can’t believe you made me carry a box of rocks up an entire mountain.”

Riku shakes his head and places the blade of the pocket knife against the stone, sharpening it. “It’s a hill, not a mountain.”

“It’s the highest point in town!”

“Second highest.”

“Oh, same difference,” Sora pouts, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Well, I’ve got something that’ll make it up to you.” Riku drops the stone back in the box and folds the knife back into his pocket, pushing himself up and jogging around to the side of the house that Sora knows the workshop is on.

It takes a couple minutes, but as soon as Riku is in eyesight Sora leaps up from the chair, forgetting his bone deep exhaustion as he recognizes what’s in Riku’s hands. “Hockey stick!” he yells without preamble, eyes shining as the other hops up onto the porch and tosses it to him.

Riku can’t help but laugh as he watches Sora lift it into the air, eyeing it like it’s something holy. “Just try to not to break this time, okay?”

Sora lowers the stick and looks at Riku haughtily. “If the badger just stayed away from Donald, I wouldn’t have had to break it,” he says matter-of-factly.

“Mmhmm,” Riku hums, knowing how protective Sora gets off the ducks that live at the pond and the other various animals that live in town. He sits back down on his stool and reaches for a nearby crate, searching through it for a decently sized piece of wood. When he finds what he wants, he pulls out the pocket knife again and settles in to start whittling.

They’re quiet, nothing but the sounds of wind through the trees around them. Sora watches Riku work with sleepy eyes, his thumb running over the hockey stick across his lap while he remains mesmerized by Riku’s practiced hands and the intricate work they do. He didn’t used to care for these quiet times when he was younger, always wanting to have noise and be doing something fun, but now that he’s older he’s grown to appreciate them. They’re comfortable, cozy.

Time all but drifts away from him, but it’s the third time that he lazily notices Riku put down his knife to scratch at the dark birthmark on his wrist that he realizes it’s an odd occurrence. “Hey, Ri,” Sora mumbles past a yawn, trying to blink himself awake. His eyes trail up to his friend’s face and he finally notices him staring out into the woods that surround the entire town, an almost… distressed look on his face. “Riku,” he calls again, but when there’s no response he leans forward and pokes his shoulder.

Riku sucks a harsh breath in, jolting hard at the touch. His fingers wrap around his left wrist tightly and his head whips around to look at where the disturbance came from.

Sora doesn’t like the tint of fear he can see behind his eyes. “Hey,” he says worriedly, putting the stick aside so he can scooch to the edge of the chair to be closer to the other. “Are you okay?” He looks down at Riku’s hands and, despite the one covering his wrist, he can see the slightest sign of raised scratch marks, the skin around it red and irritated. “You’ve been messing with your birthmark a lot today.”

Riku lets Sora pry his fingers from his arm, the coolness from his skin soothing against the angry lines raked over the dark, nearly purple, heart shaped mark on the inside of his wrist. “Not a birthmark,” he murmurs, but the distinction doesn’t really matter. He’s had it for as long as he can remember and likely before that, too. “Sorry,” he apologizes with a sigh. He slips his arm away from Sora’s fingertips and settles it on his lap, his eyes going back to the sea of pines in front of them. He could run and leap straight off this hill he’s lived his entire life on top of and he know the trees would swallow him, that he would drown in the fresh scented needles and sap before he ever hit the ground.

“Hey,” Sora repeats, louder this time so he gets Riku’s mostly full attention. “What’s up with you today? You’re acting weird.”

“Sorry,” he says again and the apologizing just makes Sora more worried. Riku drops his head, rubbing at his eyes. “I’ve been having these weird dreams the past couple nights. Haven’t been getting much sleep.”

“Oh?” Sora tilts his head, questioning and curious. “What about?”

Riku shakes his head, eyes still closed. “I don’t… I don’t remember. I wake up in a cold sweat and don’t know where I am for a second and then it’s just… nothing. Last thing I remember is going to sleep.”

“Huh…” Sora trails, scraping his teeth against his bottom lip. “Weird.”

“A pain is what it is,” Riku grunts. His fingers are pressed against his temples, rubbing in small concentrated circles. “Giving me a headache.” He breathes out slowly through his nose, dropping his hands and finally lifting his head to look back out at the tree line. “But ever since they started, there’s one thing I can’t stop thinking about.”

Sora shivers, goosebumps raising on his uncovered arms as a cold breeze blows past. “What?” he says after a moment, urging him to continue as he bundles back up in his hat and jacket.

“I’ve lived here my entire life, right on the same hill looking at the same trees for as far back as my memories go,” he says, eyes focused yet somehow distant, seeing something that Sora can’t. “Yet I’ve never been past the start of these woods. Isn’t that strange? Shouldn’t that be weird?”

Sora’s nose scrunches up on one side as he tugs the flaps of his hat down, his bangs pressing against his face. “What are you talking about? Yes, you have.”

Riku spins around on the stool so fast that Sora jolts backwards, his back hitting the carved rods that make up the back of the chair. “What are _you_ talking about?”

“You-“ Sora starts then stops, squinting at Riku. “You really don’t remember?” The glare he gets in response is enough of an answer. “Back when we were kids, it was a couple days before you gave me this.” Sora’s thumb hooks around the silver chain around his neck and pulls the necklace out so that the silver crown on its center comes out from the confines of his shirt. He tucks it back beneath the fabric after a moment, patting it against his chest. “Then we found Kairi a couple weeks later. You don’t remember that?”

“I remember Kairi and the necklace, but…” he shakes his head.

Sora hums then snaps his fingers with an idea. “Maybe you repressed it!”

“Huh?” Riku deadpans, unimpressed by his conclusion.

“Okay, so we were little and would play around the tree line all the time, right?” Sora begins, launching into full storytelling mode. “And you know, the adults would always be all “don’t go in the woods!” blah blah, but that day-“ he pauses for dramatic effect, despite knowing he wasn’t really supposed to be telling this story for entertainment purposes. “We heard something in the woods.”

Riku pales slightly. “What?” Aside from the occasional deer, there’s never anything in the woods.

“Yeah, I can’t remember what exactly it sounded like, but we thought it was a monster so we took those wooden swords your dad made us and we snuck off into the woods. We wandered around for a little bit, staying pretty close to town, but then you said you saw something and took off after it! I tried to chase you, but we got separated. When I got out of the woods all the adults were freaking out, asking what we were doing, but you know I was like four and scared so I just cried and said I didn’t know where you went. There was a search party, but no one could find you. Then all the sudden, once it hit nightfall, one of the returning searchers found you asleep against a tree right on the edge of the woods.”

Sora studies Riku’s face for a few moments, the confused look on his face just as telling as the way he’s gnawing on the inside of his cheek. “You… really don’t remember any of that, do you?”

“I… I don’t…” Riku answers quietly, shaken by the sudden influx of information.

“Oh…” Sora nods, slightly crestfallen. “Well, like I said, we were little and it was probably scary for you so maybe you just repressed it. I mean, Mom told me not to talk about ‘cause it would probably make you upset, and if just hearing about it could do that than remembering it probably-“

“Hey, Sora,” Riku interrupts. He keeps voice lighter, even. “Aren’t we supposed to meet Kairi at the diner today?”

“Oh crap!” Sora shouts, scrambling out of the chair and grabbing the hockey stick off the ground. He turns around, jogging in place as he looks at Riku in desperation. “Come on, come on! If we’re late she’s gonna give us the _Look_!”

“Grab my jacket out of the firewood, would ya?” he asks and Sora salutes before running off to get it. Riku pushes himself up again, grabbing his knife from the ground and pocketing it. His eyes return to the serene greenery of the forest, the trees unwilling to answer his silent inquiry.

“Riku!” Sora yells from the edge of the slope.

“I’m coming!” he yells back. A cold wind whistles past him and he rubs at his ear to stop the faint echo it brings.


	2. Chapter 2

Kairi sits on the bench outside of Destiny Diner, arms crossed while her foot taps impatiently against the sidewalk. She’s used to Sora being late, not that it makes her any less annoyed, but Riku at least tends to be punctual. She huffs. They must be together. There’s only one reason she’ll accept for them being late, but she doubts either of them have the spine for it so she’s not getting her hopes up.

She’s about to just give up on waiting. It’s too cold for her to be expected to wait for them to order all once. She sighs, the moisture from her breath visibly condensing in the air in front of her.

“Aa!” she yelps, head snapping to the side to see an old St Bernard nudging her bare hand with his cold wet nose. “Oh, Goofy, it’s just you,” she breathes in relief, give him a thorough pet on the head. While she still can’t believe she forgot her gloves at home, she knows she would have taken them off to pet him anyways. Besides, he’s radiating a fair bit of warmth right now that she’s finding quite welcome.

“Sorry, Goof, but no scraps yet. We’ve gotta wait for those dumb boys to show up,” she says with a tired smile. Goofy gives a hoarse woof and she takes that as agreement.

“Kairi, I’m _so_ sorry!”

“Speak of the dummies and they shall appear,” she sighs, her hand dropping from the dog’s fluffy head as she stands. Sora is running at her, shouting and waving from down the street while Riku takes his time walking instead. “About time you showed up,” she chastises, still tapping her foot. “I’ve been waiting out here for fifteen minutes. It’s freezing!”

“It’s not that cold,” Riku says as he approaches, looking at Sora worriedly as the brunette props himself up with the hockey stick and pants from all his running.

“Are you kidding me?” Kairi asks incredulously. She ignores the hockey stick in Sora’s hands, her eyes instead widening when she gets a glimpse of Riku. “Why do you have your jacket open?”

Riku shrugs, the open flaps of the jacket further revealing his shirt with the movement. “I told you, it’s not that cold.” He passes by both of them to pull the door to the diner open, holding it as they walk in. “It’s the middle of autumn, there hasn’t even been any snow yet.”

“Wouldn’t count on that for very long,” comes the wary voice of the waitress behind the counter, an older woman with greying hair. She watches as Kairi shuffles over to a booth, the two boys pulling off their jackets and hats and dumping them over the empty chairs by the front window before they join her. “Looks like the first snowstorm of the season is blowing in overnight. Temp will be dropping until it gets here.”

“What?!” Sora cries, whipping his head around to look at her. “Isn’t it a little early for that?!”

The waitress shrugs. “I don’t control the weather, I’m just telling you what I’ve heard. But I know you kids like to get into trouble, so just be sure to get home early tonight so your parents don’t worry. Don’t need you hooligans going and getting lost in a blizzard on the outskirts. Gonna have to find you if that happens.”

“We’re not hooligans, we’re totally well behaved!” Sora laughs as he slides in next to Kairi who immediately latches on to him to leech his warmth.

“Mmhmm, sure you are,” the waitress hums, a twinkle in her eye that comes from knowing these kids since they were small little rascals. “The usual?”

“The usual!” Sora nods and she walks off into the back. “Hey,” he says after a moment, looking down to where Kairi has wrapped herself around his arm. “You really are feeling cold. You sure you’re not sick or something?”

She shakes her head. “I’m not sick, but I swear I’m just… feeling colder by the day. I don’t even think it’s related to the temperature anymore.” She locks her jaw so her teeth don’t start chattering just at the thought of snowfall making it even colder. She looks across the table to see Riku wincing, his hand going to rub at his forehead. “Are _you_ okay? You’re not looking too hot yourself, you know.”

Riku grunts in response, closing his eyes and waving off her concern.

“Riku’s been having nightmares, apparently,” Sora helpfully informs her, leaning his cheek against the top of her head while both of them stare at the older boy in question.

“About what?” Kairi inquires, her concern growing. She’s known Riku for long enough to know he’s not the type to lose sleep over some dream conjured nonsense.

Sora shakes his head and Kairi doesn’t appreciate the way it makes her hat bunch up her hair, but she doesn’t say anything. “Can’t remember. But he doesn’t sleep after he wakes up. I think sleep deprivation is giving him the headaches.”

“Mmm makes sense,” she hums before turning her head to look at Sora and pinching his nose.

“Hey!”

“Didn’t think I’d hear that kind of logic coming from you, though,” she giggles with a smirk, letting him go. “If you can’t sleep ‘cause you’re spooked,” Kairi says casually, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes as she looks back at Riku, “Then maybe you should try sleeping over at one of our houses. Might help you sleep if you know you’re not alone.”

Sora gasps in excitement. “Kai, that’s a great idea! Riku, you can sleep my house whenever you want. It’ll be like the sleepovers we had when we were kids!”

“Yeah,” Riku mutters, “I’ll get right on that.” He sighs and drops his arms to table, cracking his eyes back open and looking out the window. The tree line isn’t far away.

“Riku?” Kairi says after a minute, following his line of sight. There’s nothing there but trees starting to become barren and the dense brush that sprouts up randomly from the ground.

Sora looks at him worriedly. “Riku-“

“It’s weird, Sora, okay?” Riku says suddenly. He doesn’t break his staring contest with the trees, but his fingers come up to rub at his ear. “I don’t wanna hear anything saying it’s not from the person who believes in Bigfoot.” Even if Sora says it’s just because he doesn’t remember, he knows there’s more to it than that. There has to be.

Sora gasps offendedly. “Bigfoot _is_ real. He probably lives out in _our_ woods.”

“I think we would have seen him by now if that was the case,” Kairi laughs, leaning back on Sora but still flickering her eyes between Riku and the forest.

“There’s something weird going on here,” Riku says seriously, finally straightening in his seat and looking at the pair across from him. Sora finally takes notice of the dark bags under his eyes that aren’t usually there, the contrast making his teal eyes seem more vibrant. “And I’m going to figure out what it is.”

The sudden clatter of a ceramic plate against the table shatters the tense atmosphere that’s formed around them, all of them flinching at the sound and snapping their eyes to look at the waitress. She slides the full mug of hot chocolate over to Kairi, who grasps the warm mug eagerly and sighs as the heat seeps into her skin. Sora starts digging into the pie on the plate in front of before she even sets down the milkshake in front of Riku. “You kids enjoy,” she says with a smile, going back into the kitchen likely to take a break. It’s not like a diner in a small town ever gets that busy.

“You’re crazy if you can drink something that cold right now,” Kairi admonishes with a shake of her head and feels chills run down her spine when Riku purposely makes eye contact while taking a long sip of his milkshake. “Ugh, you’re the worst,” she groans, taking a sip of her steaming beverage to counteract the shivers now shaking her body.

Sora hums as he takes another bite of warm cinnamon apple pie, almost missing Riku swiping a chunk of the sweetened filling off his plate. “Hey!”

Riku grins as he plops it in his mouth, licking his fingers. Sora isn’t fooled by the expression, though, not when he can see the tension hiding in the crinkles of his eyes. He doesn’t say anything, though, none of them do, not when they’re all enjoying their treats.

“If a snowstorm really is coming in,” Riku says after a few minutes, scooching closer to the window so he can get a glimpse of the sky. The blue sky they saw walking over is being steadily consumed by a sheet of white, the sky becoming blank until it resembles an untouched canvas. “Which it looks like it is, we should probably head back home after this.”

Sora frowns, slinking down the vinyl seat and scooting the pieces of crumbled topping around his plate with a fork. “This sucks, I wanted to go fishing,” he mumbles with a pout.

“Sooner winter starts the sooner the pond freezes over which means the sooner you get to use that hockey stick for actual hockey,” Riku points out, loudly sucking down the last remnants of his milkshake through a straw.

Sora lights up a bit at that. Playing hockey is one of his favorite hobbies and it’s been so long since he’s gotten to play that he’s just itching to get on the ice again. “I do wanna try out that new stick…”

“Oh, so it’s from Riku,” Kairi says with an air of understanding. “Honestly, I thought you might have been running because you stole it from Tidus or something.”

“I didn’t steal it!” Sora shouts a bit too loud in offense. “And I was running to get to you so you wouldn’t be mad!”

“Ah, then I guess it worked,” she smirks, copying Riku and snatching a piece of apple from the plate.

Sora circles the plate with his arms, huddling it close to his chest protectively. “Why don’t you guys just get your own pie?”

“It’s more fun to steal yours,” they answer in honest unison. They grin at each other, high fiving across the table to Sora’s dismay.

“You guys are so mean,” he mumbles under his breath. He scrapes together the remnants of filling and crust with the edge of his fork and purposefully eats it, glaring at his friends while he does.

“And you never pay, so we’re even,” Riku jokes as he digs around in his pocket. He slaps some bills on the table and slides out of the booth, going to grab his jacket and hat.

“Kairi never pays, either!” Sora defends, scooting out of the booth to do the same.

“That’s because Riku is a gentleman,” Kairi smiles pointedly at Sora before giving Riku a wink.

Riku rolls his eyes as he fixes the high collar of his jacket. “It’s because you fix the shit up at the shop for free.”

Sora yanks his hat down too far in a burst of energy at those words, knocking it back a moment later so he can see. “I deliver all your packages and mail! I have to climb a mountain to do that!”

“Hill,” Riku corrects out of habit. “And I just paid for you, didn’t I? Besides, I don’t pay you to do that. If it’s that much of a hassle I’ll just go get it myself.”

Sora huffs, lips twisting as he knows he walked into that one. He’s been delivering the mail to Riku’s family for years, he’s not going to stop now. He grabs the hockey stick leaning against the wall and walks to the door, leaning back on it so it slowly starts to open. “Yeah, well-“

“Don’t leave just yet,” the waitress calls, leaning out the door that leads to the kitchen. “You’re not gonna make poor Goofy wait out there without even giving him a reward, are you?” She disappears for a moment then walks out of the back with a steak bone in her hand, holding it out for Sora who rushes to take it.

“Goofy’s out there and I didn’t even notice?!” he yells, making the waitress wince. The other two wave goodbye as he sprints out the door, looking around frantically for his canine friend. “Goofy!” he calls gleefully, spotting the old dog sleeping under the bench.

The dog perks up at the call of his name, yawning before seeing the treat in Sora’s hand. He gets up hurriedly, trotting over to him and sitting, waiting to be rewarded.

“Aw, good boy!” Sora gushes, giving him the bone before he ruffles both sides of the St Bernard’s head. “You wanna come stay at my house tonight? I know you do, yes you do,” he coos, pressing his forehead to the dog’s face. “Hey Kairi, want me and Goofy to walk you home?”

“Oh, uh, sure,” she answers distractedly, already rubbing her arms to try to impart some warmth into them. She can’t believe it’s gotten colder out. “But what about you, Riku? Are you sure you’re feeling o-“ She pauses as she turns her head from the right to left, from Sora to Riku. “Riku…?” she questions slowly, worry flooding her again as she watches him stare at the sky with a strange look on face, something almost akin to determination schooling his features.

“It’s late October,” Riku starts and Sora lets go of Goofy to straighten up and give Riku has attention, his tone setting an alarm off in his brain. “And it just went from perfect fall weather to a snow warning in less than thirty minutes.” He tilts his head back down and stares at his friends. “And neither of you find that strange?”

Kairi shuffles in place awkwardly and Sora scratches at the back of his head. “It’s not that it’s _not_ weird-” Sora starts, but the look Kairi shoots him tells him he should stop unless he wants to eat his words.

“Got it,” Riku nods, obviously done with the conversation. “See you guys later then.” His turns his back on them and starts walking back to his house, waving before his shoves his hands in pockets.

Kairi continues to give Sora the Look and he throws his arms up in exasperation. “What did you want me to say?!”

Her face falters and she averts her eyes to the ground. “He’s obviously hung up on all this dream stuff and you making fun of it isn’t making it any better.” She shoves her hands into her pockets and starts down the road in the direction both of them live.

Sora motions for Goofy to follow and he does, holding the bone tightly between his teeth. “I wasn’t trying to make fun of him,” Sora pouts as soon as he catches up with her, hands fidgeting against the smooth wood of the hockey stick. He glances up at the sky. “It really _is_ weird. I just don’t know if it’s the same weird Riku’s making it out to be,” he sighs. He hates upsetting his friends.

“Just…” Kairi sighs now, too, finding it hard to think past how much she just wants to be inside the heat of her house now. “Let’s not bring it up tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay,” Sora nods, pushing back the lingering feeling of wrongness in his chest.


	3. Chapter 3

“I’m home!”

Goofy trots into the house like he owns the place, only sparing a second to sniff the air before heading up the stairs.

Sora isn’t surprised by the silence that envelops his home. If anything, it’s almost homier this way. Since his family runs the town post office a few blocks away, his parents spend most of their time there instead of their house. He doesn’t mind, not really. He at least doesn’t have to spend his entire day down there, just heading out in the morning to grab the satchel with the mail in it, already sorted, and delivering it before getting the day to himself.

He glances outside again, his hand still resting on the knob to the front door. It’s gotten darker out somehow, despite the fact that he can still see the sun through the white veil of clouds. “Must be some fog rolling in,” he mumbles to himself, closing the door and shutting off his view of the outside world.

He doesn’t know if it’s the weather, the walk home, or just the overall reflection of how his day has gone, but he’s exhausted. He yawns loudly as he trudges up the stairs, pulling off his hat and jacket with sluggish movements and throwing them on the bedroom floor as soon as he shoulders past the half open door. He rubs at his eyes as he clumsily tries to kick off his shoes, grabbing hold of the wall when he starts to lose balance. He doesn’t even have the energy to change into pajamas.

“Come on, Goof,” he yawns again, patting the excessive pile of blankets that cover his bed. He scratches at the skin beneath his silver pendant, watching as Goofy stares at him with droopy eyes before nudging over a crumpled pair of sweatpants that have probably been on the floor for a month. Sora blinks a few times, a little more awake but no less tired. “Fine, fine,” he grumbles, tripping over himself to change out of the dirty pants he’s now noticing are covered in dried mud and into the fleece lined comfort of the sweatpants. “Okay, good call,” he admits, ruffling the fur on Goofy’s head. He figures his shirt is clean enough after being covered by layers all day.

Sora slips under the obscene amount of blankets with practiced ease, immediately sighing into the warm and weighted relief they provide. The bed bounces as Goofy leaps up, curling up at the bottom on top of Sora’s feet.

“Good night, Goof,” Sora says through one last yawn, trying to ignore the fact that it’s hardly close to night at all. He stares out the window above his bed and sees the first flurries of falling snow as his eyes slide shut.

 

~

 

It’s not the sounds from outside that wake Sora up. Whistling winds and snapping branches are sounds that he’s easily learned to tune out and sleep through over the years. It’s the feeling of Goofy growling that groggily rouses him to something akin to wakefulness, the harsh vibrations of the St Bernard’s chest managing to get through all the covers until they tickle at Sora’s feet.

“Jus’ a storm, ‘oof,” he slurs through a heavy veil of unconsciousness. There’s a lot of noise coming from outside, the howling wind loudest of all. “Mus’ be one hell o’ a storm,” he mumbles, head falling back into the fluffy comfort of his pillow.

He’s relieved when Goofy’s growling stops only to be instantly flooded with confusion when he starts whining instead. “Goof?” he calls, a little more awake as he pushes himself up and feels around for the old dog.

Goofy continues crying, nuzzling his nose against the brunette’s fingers and palm.

“Alright, alright, I’m up,” Sora gives in as he sits up fully, rubbing his bleary eyes roughly until he can see into the darkness a bit better. “What’s wrong, boy?”

The noise outside continues to grow louder as do Goofy’s whines.

“It’s just trees,” he assures. “Trees and the wind.”

There’s a set of harsh raps against the window, ones that couldn’t possibly be made be trees since there aren’t any close enough to his room to do that.

Sora feels much more awake now. “What the-“ He fumbles for the lamp on his nightstand, wincing when the bright yellow light floods the room. Goofy jumps up to put his front feet on the windowsill, pawing at the glass as he continues to cry.

Sora’s heart rate picks up and he swallows to try to stop the pounding from reaching his throat. It doesn’t work. “What’s… what’s out there, boy?” He nears the window and gapes. This isn’t a little early season snow, this is a goddamn blizzard.

“What the hell…” Sora questions aloud as confusion wracks his system. He’s never seen anything like this, not this late in the year.

A vaguely shaped shadow taps against the window again and Sora reels back and falls on the bed, startled. He slaps his hands over his mouth, holding in the scream lodged firmly in his esophagus as he glances at the clock on the nightstand. 3:07 am. He does _not_ need to be waking his parents up right now. He’s lucky their room is downstairs.

There’s more knocking at the window and he watches the blob of a shadow move until it unfurls and presses itself firmly against the glass. A hand. That’s a hand.

Sora scrambles to the window, flipping the lock and sliding the innermost windowpane all the way open. He shivers as the icy winds flood his room, snow melting as it hits his sheets and soaks into them. “H-h-he-l-lo?” he calls out into the storm, teeth chattering harshly against each other.

Something comes flying at him and he ducks just in time, whipping his head around to see a soggy boot sail through his bedroom and splat on his floor, shortly followed by a second one. He hears a grunt from outside and turns back around to see gloved fingers curled over the window frame, a body revealing itself a moment later.

“Riku?!” Sora screeches in a high-pitched tone and it’s all he can do to keep it from not escalating into an actual scream.

Riku doesn’t answer as he hauls himself through the window and lands on the queen-sized bed, turning around to yank the window shut and lock it. “You really need an easier way to get up here. Firewood stack is barely tall enough,” he pants, eyes closed and face turned away from Sora.

“What are you doing here?!” Sora hisses, heart nearly beating out of his chest due to a mixture of emotions he can’t possibly be expected to sort through right now. “It’s three in the morning and _blizzarding_!”

Riku chuckles, but it sounds hollow. “Thought you said I could sleep over whenever.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t mean in the middle of a blizzard! Did you walk here?! Of course you walked here, how else would you even get here? And why won’t you look at me?!” It’s that last question that bothers him the most for some reason. He moves closer to Riku who puts a hand out stop him but he ignores it, letting the hand press against his chest. The arm isn’t using any force, instead folding easily as Sora gets near enough for his knees to press against the other’s thigh.

He grabs Riku’s face with his hands, yanking them away like he’s been burnt when Riku lets out a sharp pained hiss through clenched teeth. Sora hesitates before he reaches for him again, gently framing Riku’s jaw as he guides him to look in his direction.

His skin does burn in a way, Riku’s own skin both flush and pale and so cold to the touch that it prickles painfully against Sora’s palms. There’s a sizeable lump swelling just below his right eye, right along his cheekbone, where the skin is discoloring into a painful looking bruise, deep violet and yellowing on the edges. There’s a deep cut at the core of it, the blood thick and coagulated and matting his light-colored hair to the wound. It’s his eyes that really catch Sora’s attention, though, and not because of the deep set and blackening bags beneath them. It’s the haunted look his tired eyes carry, dimming the brightness that usually makes his teal gaze vibrant.

“What happened, Riku?” Sora asks quietly, barely able to make his voice rise above a whisper.

Riku doesn’t turn his face away but he averts his eyes, looking anywhere that isn’t obscured by Sora. “Hailing out,” he answers simply, even if he knows that’s not what the question was asking.

Sora takes a breath and lets it come out his nose, nodding to himself a few times while he mentally tries to figure out what to do. “Okay. I’ll go get the first aid kit.” He catches the strange expression that flickers across Riku’s face when his hands leave his face and he pulls back so Riku’s hand drops limply to the bed. He doesn’t know what to make of that. He scoots off the bed and tries to be quiet as he pads down the hallway into the bathroom, flicking on the light as he digs through the cabinet beneath the sink for the small red box he keeps for emergencies. Or rather, his friends keep here for emergencies, since he’s the one usually getting hurt and in need of patching up. The tin is cold in his hands.

Back in the room, Riku is slumping against the wall with his legs stretched along the bed, eyes barely open as his head starts to loll towards his shoulder.

“Hey, don’t doze off just yet,” Sora says softly, trying to remember the way Kairi talks when she comforts him. “I know you’re tired, but let me clean this up. Then we can go to sleep, okay?” Riku grunts but straightens up and Sora moves over him to sit on his thighs so he’s close enough to actually clean the cut. “Want me to get some water to clean the blood out of your hair?” he asks but he already knows the answer.

Riku shakes his head. “No. I’ll worry about it later.” Sora goes to open the box but is stopped when Riku puts his hand up again, letting the hand gently push him back while Riku leans forward a bit as he struggles to tug his jacket off. He gets it eventually, tossing it to the floor before pulling off his gloves and hat and throwing those too. “Your blankets will melt me if I fall asleep with all that on.”

Sora shakes his head, snorting softly as he sets the tin on his lap. “My blanket cocoon is what’s gonna save your frozen ass from hypothermia.” He pulls out a packet containing an alcohol wipe and tears the edge off, frowning as he wonders how best to get the matted hair out of the cut.

Riku seems to catch onto his thought process because he runs his fingers through his hair, forcibly unsticking the strands of hair as he pulls the rest of it back. He screws his eyes shut, wincing, and lets go when he fingers are stopped by the knots formed in the blood. “There,” he breathes, face relaxing and hands dropping back down.

It takes everything in Sora’s power not to jolt when they rest on his hips. He takes a deep breath and steels himself, ignoring it. It’s not a big deal and he doesn’t need to make it out to be one, especially not when he’s supposed to be cleaning this cut on Riku’s face that’s starting to look much more like a gash now that clumps of hair aren’t hiding the worst of it. “How big was that piece of hail that it did this much damage?” he asks as he leans in closer, trying to hold Riku’s skin as gently as possible so he can hopefully wipe the blood away without having to scrub at the skin.

Riku shrugs. “Dunno. Didn’t see it coming. Fucking hurt, though,” he grits out, teeth grinding at the sting of alcohol seeping into raw tissue.

“Yeah, I bet,” Sora nods. He knows he has to clean it, but his heart clenches painfully every time Riku winces. “Must’ve been the size of a fist, at least.”

“Felt like a fist,” Riku chuckles, but it still rings empty. Sora doesn’t care much for the sound.

They fall silent as Sora continues to work, Riku watching him through barely open eyes as he tries to stay awake. With every aid Sora removes from the box he feels more and more grateful to his friends for never listening to him when he says he’s fine just slapping a band-aid on. He’s almost even grateful for splitting his knee open last summer because he knows that’s the only reason these butterfly closures are in here, bought at the pharmacy at Kairi’s adamant “request.”

The gash unfortunately still looks fairly bad, even with the blood and dirt cleaned out of it. The lump is still very much a lump, the bruise extending up and over his nose and up past his eye while the bottom of it cups his jawline in a yellowed vice grip. The violet gives way to dotted blotches of red and seems almost black around the gash, the flayed open skin now tightly held together with the adhesive strips that will hopefully help the skin sew itself shut soon.

“You probably need stitches for that…” Sora thinks out loud. There’s only so much a first aid kit can do.

“I’ll put some witch hazel on it when I go home, it’ll be fine,” Riku brushes off, closing his eyes entirely.

“I think you’re gonna need more than tha-AT!” Sora shouts the end of the sentence as Riku unceremoniously falls to his side to lay down, dragging Sora with him. “Hey, you should ice that before-“

“Sleep,” Riku says simply, voice already starting to slur. He moves his legs so Sora isn’t half trapped beneath them, but he leaves his hands where they are.

Sora cranes his neck to look at the clock and sighs. Almost 4 am. He’s exhausted, anyways. He reaches for the lamp and manages to turn it off after a few tries before pulling a handful of blankets over them. Goofy emerges from where he was laying on the floor at the end of the bed and snuggles next to Riku, providing him extra warmth. Riku unseeingly pats the dog’s head in thanks.

“I’m gonna have to get up soon to go to the post,” Sora reminds him as he gets comfortable. He hopes Riku doesn’t mind as he snuggles up closer to him, the extra body heat too enticing to ignore. Really, it’s basically the same as the sleepovers they used to have as kids. Yep, basically the same. Which means he has no reason to make a big deal out of this.

Riku hums in acknowledgement, but Sora doesn’t know if that actually means he understood what he said. Riku doesn’t say anything else and when his arms tighten around his waist a few minutes later, Sora tells his racing heart that it’s just an unconscious movement. He still uses it as an excuse to curl up even closer.

He’s almost asleep when he hears Riku mumble something.

“Huh?” Sora mutters back, barely able to even form the sound.

“Train is here,” Riku repeats and Sora feels his eyes shoot open. He looks up at Riku’s face but his expression is peaceful, relaxed, and he’s certain he’s asleep. Sora looks back at the clock. Two minutes until 4 am.

He doesn’t go back to sleep.

 

~

 

Sora never starts his shifts earlier than seven. Hell, if he can get away with it, he won’t even roll out of bed until past nine, even if he does usually get an earful from his mother about how people expect their mail at a certain time and he better get running unless he wants to give the family business a bad reputation. He doesn’t really understand all that, not when punctuality isn’t a huge deal in their small sleepy town, but he’s learned better than to argue with his mother. He never wins.

But here he is, not even 6 am yet, looking up the wooden sign marking the small building as the Destiny Forge Post Office. Unable to sleep, he got ready for work as soon as the storm stopped, leaving Riku sleeping in his bed with Goofy who took his spot as soon as he got up.

He didn’t question how quick the blizzard cleared up when he was looking for an excuse to do something, but after stomping through the dense layers of snow to get through town he’s starting to find it… weird.

“Don’t let Riku hear you thinking like that,” he mutters under his breath and goes to pull the door to the post office open. “He’ll never let you live it down.”

The bell above the door chimes and his mother turns around to look at him from where she stands behind the counter. “Oh! Well, aren’t you up early this morning! Storm keep you awake?”

“…Yeah,” he answers with a nod after a moment. That’s a safe answer to go with. “But since I’m up anyways, I figured I’d just get my deliveries out of the way early today.”

She smiles at him brightly, the same smile he has that everyone in town says he inherited from her. “I appreciate your enthusiasm, but you’re gonna have to wait for Dad to get back. He has your bag. But here, I’ve got all the letters sorted so you can just put them in when you get it back.” She slides a plastic container across the counter, the letters all perfectly lined up inside it.

“Where is Dad?” Sora asks, flipping through the letters idly, deciding the best route to go today.

“Did you eat breakfast before you left?”

Sora looks up, his mother facing the other way as she sorts through packages. “Uh… no,” he answers after a second. “Did you… not… hear me?” he asks slowly, confusion lining his brows. “Where’s-“

“Since you’re completing your shift so early, maybe you can go get breakfast at the diner with your friends. I know Riku is always up early to work, his parents tell me he gets up earlier than they do most days,” she laughs good-naturedly. “I’m sure Cid has Kairi waking up early, too, to help get the shop ready.”

“Yeah…” Sora trails. He’s got a strange feeling about this entire conversation. A bad feeling. He jumps when the bell rings again, looking over his shoulder to see his father walking in, hauling a canvas lined cart in behind him that was likely on the sled outside if it was able to get through the snow.

“Oh, mornin’ Sora,” his dad calls brightly, dropping the large cart onto a flat one with wheels so he can easily move it to the back room where they’ll sort through it more thoroughly. He fishes through it and pulls out the old worn out satchel Sora uses for the mail. “Sorry, this must’ve accidentally fallen in and I didn’t even notice until I left.”

Sora takes the bag, the material soft and familiar in his hands. He flips it open and starts shoving letters inside, trying not to lose the order but more concerned with looking like he’s not in a rush to get out of there. He pushes the empty container back across the counter as his dad leaves the back room empty handed, going to stand next to his wife to help her out. “Hey, I was just thinking, but,” Sora starts nonchalantly, looping the strap of the bag over his head and getting the bulk of it situated against his hip. “Where does the mail come from, anyways?”

He looks up and is startled to be met with two sets of eyes looking at him, matching smiles on their lips. Everything about them looks wrong, unnatural. It feels like he’s looking at two strangers instead of his parents. “You better get going,” his mother says, voice too light and high-pitched to be her own, straining to stay even. “You don’t want the mail to be late now, do you? They might start looking for you if it is.”

Sora’s hands tighten around the strap across his chest, twisting the fabric nervously. “Right, right,” he nods with a forced laugh, backing up towards the front door. “We-Well, I’ll be off then! See you later!” He fumbles for the doorknob and flings the door open, the harsh sound of the bell ringing wildly grating to his ears. He slams the door behind him and starts to hurry down the road, turning down another winding street where he breaks off into a sprint.

He needs to deliver the mail quickly then get back home. He’s not going back to the post office alone.

He needs to talk to Riku.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter has a companion piece - [these are hard times for dreamers], second in the vanishing point series.


	4. Chapter 4

Sora is fairly certain of two things.

One – in all of the years he’s been acting as Destiny Forge’s local mailboy he has never _ever_ delivered the mail that quickly.

Two – the sleeping townsfolk _really_ don’t like being woken up by a frenzied teenager slamming their rusty mailboxes shut.

And, well, he supposes there might be a third thing to add to that list.

Three – something weird is definitely going on in town. He still isn’t keen on admitting that Riku was right, though.

It’s with an overwhelming sense of relief that his finds himself pounding down the only road in town more familiar to him than the one leading to Riku, his house in view. He isn’t going back to the post office to drop off his bag, not by himself. He can still feel his skin crawling at the memory of how his parents looked at him, like they were total strangers, almost like they were… _possessed_ or something.

“Easy with the crazy talk there, Sora,” he mumbles to himself as he nears the front porch. “That’s Riku’s line of work now.”

Speaking of Riku, though…

Sora pushes the front door open in a rush. “Ri-!” His shout is cut off halfway as he immediately trips over Goofy, the old dog laying right in the middle of the floor. He’s lucky he didn’t just crack his head on the stairs. He whips his head around to glare over his shoulder, but the St Bernard just looks at him with sleepy eyes, yawning before getting up and trotting out of the house to go on his daily stroll around town.

Sora gets up with a huff, slamming the door shut and going back to running up the stairs. “Riku! Riku, I need to talk to…” he trails as throws the bedroom door open, eyes going wide, “you…”

“Oh, there you are,” Riku answers nonchalantly, wet strands of hair sticking to his face and neck leaving droplets of water to roll down his naked torso. “I was wondering where you went. Don’t think I’ve ever seen your lazy ass up before I am.”

“ _Hey_ ,” Sora pouts at the teasing insult, eyes flicking up to glare at Riku’s face before being drawn back down by some magnetic force to the clear display of muscle (and prominent v-line, that should really be illegal) staring him in the face. He averts his eyes, willing away the redness he knows is crawling up his cheeks. “Why are-“

“Showered,” Riku answers before he can finish, pulling a shirt over his head. He grabs a towel and starts squeezing the water out of his hair. “Had to get the blood out, remember?”

Yeah, Sora doesn’t really think he could forget, not with the bruise so prominent against Riku’s pale skin. The swelling looks like it’s gone down, at least. “I was going to ask why you’re wearing my clothes,” Sora mutters.

Riku looks down at himself. The sweats he has on are tight and the tapered ankles cuff around his calves, the shirt he pulled on stretching across his chest a bit too much to be modest and the length of it not enough to fully cover his waist. He shrugs. “You saw what mine looked like. I threw ‘em in the wash. I’ll change back when they’re done. Besides, it’s not like you don’t constantly steal my clothes and _never give them back_ ,” he adds pointedly.

“That’s because delivering your mail is a hazard during rainy season,” Sora shoots back. He can’t count the number of times he’s had his boot get stuck in the mud and before he knows it he’s face first in the dirt. He’s grateful that Riku never makes a fuss about letting him wash off and get clean clothes at his house, but Riku’s are baggy at best on him. It’s not anything like what Riku is making him look at right now. “And that means you have clothes here! Wear those!”

Riku gives him a withering look that he swears he learned from Kairi before he leans down to pick up one of the shirts that was previously his from the floor. Despite being moved, the fabric stays stiffly crumpled in place as if its been glued like that. They both wrinkle their noses at the display. “Yeah, well, unlike some of us, I actually like wearing clean clothes.”

Sora really can’t win against evidence like that, not when he knows he for sure hasn’t done his laundry in at least a month, more likely longer. “Fine,” he huffs, trudging over to his bed and flopping down on it.

Riku raises an eyebrow. It’s not like Sora to give up a fight that easily. He looks him over for a moment, only now noticing the mail bag still on Sora’s shoulder. He rubs the towel roughly over the top of his head. “You didn’t go back to the post office?”

Two sets of eyes, blank. A pair of smiles, sharper than they should be.

Sora squeezes his eyes shut at the memory. His hands fly up, the heels of his hands pressing against his eyelids, as if he can physically force the memory back. “Riku,” he says quietly, the flickering of fear he’s been keeping tapered down now edging his voice. His arms fall away limply, eyes staring unseeingly at the ceiling. “Something weird is going on.”

Riku’s almost surprised the urge to gloat doesn’t immediately overtake him. Or maybe he’s not, not when Sora is like this. He drops the towel on the ground, combing his fingers through his hair as he takes a seat on the bed next to Sora. “What happened?”

Sora sighs, closing his eyes again before he opens them to look a bit helplessly at his best friend. “I don’t know,” he shrugs, a strain to his voice and weak smile pulling at his lips in a way that almost looks pained. “Yesterday you were just talking about all that weird stuff and like… I don’t know, it got me thinking. ‘Cause _I’ve_ never gone deep into the woods and the weather doesn’t just change from clear skies to blizzarding without warning and it got me thinking about what other weird stuff there could be…” he trails off, his voice growing quieter the more he talks. “Guess you gave me your insomnia,” he chuckles emptily. “I couldn’t fall back asleep so I went to the post early this morning and I saw Dad bringing in the mail from outside, so I… just asked.”

Riku’s eyes widen. “Asked _what_?”

“Where the mail comes from,” Sora shrugs because there’s nothing else he can do. “Riku, I don’t know what’s going on but it’s weird and it’s kind of freaking me out,” he confesses, letting the fear flood his system in hopes that letting it loose will let it ebb away. “They wouldn’t answer me. After I asked they give me the freakiest looks, like they were…” The word from his earlier thoughts comes back to mind. “ _Possessed_.”

“I asked my mom about the woods last night,” Riku starts suddenly. Sora sits up to look at him better, but his eyes are focused on the ground. “Asked if she remembered that story you told me, asked her why we only cut wood from the tree line and never go any further. I, uh… I probably shouldn’t have asked her while she was prepping dinner.”

Sora’s brows furrow, worry washing over him. “What does that-“

“She stuck the knife through the cutting board,” he answers bluntly, but Sora can hear that same lingering terror in the back of his voice, the same kind he’s feeling right now. “Not like she stabbed it, either. Like she _sliced_ through it. I don’t even how she could have done that, it’s a solid piece of wood.” He shakes his head, resting his elbows on his knees and threading his fingers through damp hair. “So it wasn’t really nightmares that brought me here. Sorry.”

It takes a moment, but when the realization that Riku is terrified to sleep in his own home hits Sora, it hits _hard_ and he suddenly feels like his lungs have deflated. “You… You climbed through my window in the middle of a blizzard.” (Because you felt safer doing that than staying in your room, he wants to add. The words stay caged behind his teeth.)

Riku snorts, folding his hands and resting his chin on them. “Yeah. Sorry.”

“Don’t say sorry, you dummy,” Sora huffs, bumping shoulders with Riku. “Nightmares or not, if you don’t wanna sleep there for whatever reason, well…” He’s glad Riku’s still not looking at him, not with how warm his face feels. “You’re always welcome here, you know? We should probably find an easier way for you to get in, though.”

Riku chuckles, “Probably. Thanks, Sora.”

He smiles and Sora thinks that makes it worth it.

Riku turns his head, looking at the mailbag again. “So, what are you gonna do about this?” he asks, patting the soft worn leather.

Frowning, Sora eyes the bag that’s served him well for so long. “I mean, I have to go back tomorrow. I can’t just stop showing up, then my parents will definitely know something’s up.” Riku hums in agreement, but it only makes Sora sigh again. “I’m just really not looking forward to going back there by myself.”

“Oh. Well, that’s easy enough to fix,” Riku brushes off simply.

Sora raises his eyebrows, “It is?”

“Yeah,” Riku shrugs. “If I’m gonna be sleeping here anyways, I can just go with you in the mornings to the post. It’s a win-win for both of us.”

“Oh. That… actually makes sense.”

“You say that like I’m the one that usually has the crazy ideas,” Riku scowls.

“Yeah, well, lately you do,” Sora grins, feeling the fear stuck tight in his chest loosen its grip for a moment before a memory of earlier shoves itself to the forefront of his mind and he can feel the fear knot in his throat. “Speaking of, uh, sleeping and… crazy… ideas, I guess…” he starts, stumbling over his words in an attempt to form a coherent sentence.

They’re silent for a second before Riku presses. “Are you gonna go on or what?”

Sora clears his throat, glancing at Riku before making sure to look anywhere except at him. “Riku, uh…” His voice lowers, his fingers fidgeting with each other as he speaks barely above a whisper. “Can you… hear the train, Riku?”

Riku feels like a bolt of frozen electricity was shot directly down his spine. “Why are you-“

There’s a loud thumping knock at the front door that has both boys jumping halfway out of their skin, Sora ending up further back on the bed while Riku’s fingers dig into the mattress. It stops for a moment only to pick up again twice as loud.

“We should… probably go see who that is,” Riku says, standing with stiff movements.

“R-right,” Sora nods, following after him. They pad down the stairs quietly and Sora hesitantly opens the door, pulling it open slowly.

Kairi doesn’t look pleased to see him. “Took you long enough,” she huffs, breath crystalizing into a white puff in front of her. She crosses her arms over her chest.

“Oh thank god, it’s just you,” Sora breathes in relief, melting against the doorframe. “You scared the shit out of us, Kai!”

“Yeah, well, just returning the favor,” she smirks, irritation clear in the creases around her eye. “Cid sent me over and told me to threaten you.”

“What for?!” Sora squawks, no longer relieved.

“He said “Tell that little punk that if he ever wakes me up before the sun is fully up in the sky again, I’m sending you after him with this.”” Kairi holds up the solid metal monkey wrench in her hand so he can get a good look at it before she starts patting it against the palm of her other hand threatening.

“That’ll kill me!”

Riku pulls the door from Sora’s grip so he can open it all the way, getting a good look at Cid’s weapon of choice. “Oh yeah,” Riku smirks. “That’ll definitely kill you.”

Kairi’s eyes widen slightly, a mix of curiosity and mischievousness brightening them as she looks between her two friends.

“I see you getting ideas,” Riku deadpans. “Don’t.”

“I have _no_ idea what you’re talking about,” Kairi waves him off, brushing past Sora to get into the warmth of the house and out of the post-snow chill outside. She turns on her heel, giving Riku a sugary smile. “Nice outfit, by the way. Sharing wardrobes? Really, a true sign of friendship,” she says sarcastically, maintaining pointed eye contact with him the entire time.

Riku returns the expression easily. “Oh, is that so? Next time I’ll be sure to stay at your house then and borrow your clothes instead.”

Kairi laughs brightly, a real smile crinkling her eyes now. “Be my guest,” she teases, smacking him on the chest with the back of her hand. “I’m sure you’ll look just lovely in my floral romper.”

“Stunning, I’m sure,” Riku responds with a roll of his eyes. “I’m gonna check to see if my clothes are dry.” He walks down the hall beside the staircase, turning off into another room.

“So, you came all the way down here just to threaten me?” Sora asks with a pout. “A real friend would at least say good morning.”

“Aw, good morning, sunshine,” Kairi coos, pressing her cheek against Sora’s as she gives him a hug. Sora can’t stay mad while he’s getting a hug, so she’s not surprised when she feels him grin and return the embrace even tighter, arms wrapping around her waist so he can spin her around a few times before he puts her down. She giggles as her feet hit the ground again, bracing her hands on Sora’s shoulders. “I was up anyways, so I figured I’d check up on you after the threatening was done,” she answers, smile fading a bit. “You know, after what happened yesterday…” She turns her head to look in the direction Riku went off in and then looks back at Sora. “Though it seems like you two have already made up?”

Sora shrugs, starting to walk backwards into the kitchen. Kairi sits at the table while Sora digs around in the pantry for the tin of hot cocoa they keep just for her. “He climbed in through my window in the middle of the night,” Sora offers for explanation. He finds the tin and sets it on the counter, now getting out a small pan and pouring some milk into it.

“It was blizzarding last night,” Kairi states obviously, dumbfounded.

Sora turns on the stove before turning back to give her a knowing look.

“That dumbass,” she grumbles. “And what was all this?” she asks, motioning to her own cheek.

Sora starts stirring the milk so it doesn’t burn and shrugs. “Said he got nailed with a chunk of hail. I tried to patch him up as best I could, but…” He shrugs again.

“You’re not the one to usually patch people up,” Kairi finishes, nodding.

Sora adds some of the chocolate mix to the warm milk, rolling his bottom lip between his teeth as he measures out the right amount that Kairi likes. “Maybe, uh- Maybe it’d be better if he stayed with you. Cid likes Riku, right?”

Kairi scoffs. “Cid? Letting another teenager stay under his roof where his daughter lives? Sorry, but he’s way too grumpy and protective for that.”

Sora laughs, “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“If it’s just a matter of bandaging, though, I’m sure I can teach you a good way to do it,” she offers. She straightens up in her seat as Sora pours the hot cocoa in three mugs, leaving one on the counter and bringing the other two to the table. Kairi takes hers gratefully, taking a sip before deciding to let it cool just a little. Her fingers drum against the table. “His nightmares… They’re really that bad?” Kairi asks quietly.

Sora wonders if he should tell her there might be more than just nightmares.

“Okay, I’m heading out,” Riku announces suddenly from the doorway, pulling on his second boot while he holds the wall for support. He’s back in the clothes he came in, the dirt and mud and little bit of blood now washed out of them.

“Where are you going?” Kairi questions, her fingers folding around the steaming mug.

“There’s something I need to check on,” Riku says vaguely, purposely not looking at either of the people in the kitchen. He straightens out his jacket collar and pulls on his beanie. Somewhere in the back of Sora’s mind he’s glad to see it’s the one he gave him for a birthday gift last year. “I’ll meet up with you guys later.”

He doesn’t say goodbye and they don’t get a chance to either, Riku turning on his heel and walking out the front door a second later.

Kairi looks at Sora pleadingly, knowing there’s something here that she missed.

Sora sighs. It’s not like they were gonna leave Kairi out of this anyways, right? He gets up and grabs the mug meant for Riku, sliding it across the table for Kairi to drink after she finishes the cup she’s working on. “Okay, I’m not totally sure what’s going on,” he starts because for the life of him he feels just as scared and confused as she looks. “But I’ll tell you what I know. _But_ you have to promise not to tell anyone else,” he says, holding out his pinkie for her.

Kairi’s face becomes serious and she hooks her own pinkie around his without hesitation, giving a purposeful nod. “I promise.”


	5. Chapter 5

“He can hear the train?”

Mugs long since drained, Kairi sits on Sora’s bed as the brunette throws the clothes littering his floor into a basket. She snuggles further into the blankets she has wrapped around her shoulders and hooded over her head, still struggling against a slight shiver that she can’t seem to shake.

“I think he can,” Sora nods, tossing a dirt encrusted pair of pants into the basket on the other side of the room. Riku may have just been trying to make a point when he picked up that shirt, but he really is running out of things to wear that are socially acceptable levels of not-dirty. “When he said it was coming… We’ve only ever seen the train at sunset. Why would he say it’s coming before sunrise unless he could hear it?”

Kairi shrugs, her movement stunted due to the cocoon of fabric she’s swaddled herself in. “I don’t know. You said he was basically asleep, right? Maybe he was just dreaming. Maybe his nightmares are about the train. I know mine are.”

“What?” Sora looks up at her, brows furrowed. “Since when?”

Kairi looks embarrassed about letting that little confession slip, blanket covered hands moving up to cover the bottom half of her face. “Since, uh… I dunno, always? As long as I can remember, at least. I mean, it’s not that weird… right?” She’s starting to panic.

“Of course it’s not weird,” Sora assures her, leaving the section of floor he’s currently cleaning up to scoot over to the bed where he pats her knee reassuringly. “The train is the first thing you can remember, right? Maybe… Maybe you’re just like Riku.”

“You mean with the trauma block?” she asks skeptically before she falters. She casts her eyes down at her lap, teeth sinking into her bottom lip as she thinks the possibility over. “It’s… not the craziest theory,” she admits after a minute, unable to stop the chill running down her spine that makes her tremble harder than before.

“You’re still cold?” Sora stands, putting his hands on her arms and trying to rub some heat into them. “I even brought the space heater in here.” Sora freezes, a dangerous thought making itself known in his mind.

An unmoving Sora worries Kairi more than anything. “…Sora…?”

“Maybe…” Sora starts moving again and Kairi can tell he’s trying to work through his thoughts, the process written clear on his face. “Maybe you really are just like Riku.”

“Didn’t we just have this conversation?” she laughs but it’s clearly not from humor.

“No, not like the trauma thing – well, yeah, that too – but no, not that,” he dismisses, shaking his head.

“Sora,” she says sternly, knocking the blankets off her body and grabbing his arms so he looks at her. “Explain. I’m not a mind reader.”

Sora nods, “Okay. So remember that story I told you downstairs, about Riku getting lost when we were little?“

“Yes…” she answers slowly.

“Well, he didn’t just get lost, he got lost out in the woods and-“

“We’re not allowed to go in the woods,” Kairi interrupts, confusion lining her face.

“Yeah, but- wait, what?” Sora stops, looking back just as confused.

Kairi’s brows furrow, her eyes focusing on where her fingers are wrapped around Sora’s arms. “Cid has always told me, ever since I got here. Whenever I asked to or tried to play in the woods, he’d say we weren’t allowed in there. Not just Cid, if anyone saw me trying to go into the woods they’d tell me I couldn’t and get me to go back into town. And I’ve never seen anyone else go in and you and Riku never tried to, so I just assumed it was, like, a _thing_. That no one is allowed in the woods and everybody knows it.”

Sora takes a step back and Kairi’s hands slide from his forearms to his wrists. “That’s-“ He shakes his head, the information for some reason being too hard to comprehend normally. He slips one hand away from hers, his fingers moving to scratch at his chest before they instinctually start to fidget with the silver necklace around his neck. “That’s not a thing, Kairi,” he finally says, getting his thoughts in order.

Kairi thinks all the warmth has been sucked out of the room. “What?”

That makes two of them. “There’s no rule, Kai. The only time I’ve ever even heard someone say not to play in the woods was back when me and Riku were little and would wander off a lot. I’ve never even heard them tell the other kids that. Actually…” he trails, thinking. “I don’t think I’ve been told not to ever since Riku got lost out there.”

“Right,” she nods. “The story you told me earlier. Riku got lost when you two were little, but he doesn’t remember it. And then few weeks later you two found me, by the train tracks.”

Sora nods. “Yeah, and Riku gave me this necklace a couple days after he got lost, too.”

Kairi stares at him for a few moments before her eyes go to the necklace, narrowing in focus. “Sora?”

“Yeah?” he answers warily, his other arm falling to his side when Kairi lets go of it to stand. She’s stands right in front of him, only few inches apart, and he drops the crown-shaped pendant against his shirt when her own hand reaches for it.

She picks up the necklace delicately, less because of fragility and more as a respect to its personal value. “It’s strange,” she mumbles to no one in particular, but Sora is listening very carefully. “I know I’ve seen this necklace a hundred times before, but it’s never felt so… familiar.” The crown held firmly between her thumb and finger, she lifts her gaze to meet Sora’s. “Where did Riku get this necklace?”

The question strikes him like a bullet, so unknowingly odd that he can’t believe he’s never questioned its origin himself. “I- I don’t know,” he answers honestly. Kairi lets go of the necklace and he tucks it back beneath his shirt.

“Laundry can wait until later, we need to find Riku. This whole me and Riku being the same thing, it’s better if he’s part of this conversation. It’s better if we can figure things out together. I’m making you both promise to include me this time,” she says seriously with only the slightest of pouts making it to her lips. She sits back on the bed to pull on her boots. “Now we just need to figure out where he went.”

“I think I might have an idea,” Sora chimes in, stumbling over his laundry basket and all of the clothes that didn’t make it in to get to his closet. He yanks out a jacket, sliding his arms into it before realizing it’s inside out. “Right before you knocked, I was asking Riku about the train, but I don’t think he was gonna answer.”

Kairi stands, pulling Sora’s jacket off of him by force and fixing it before throwing it back. “So you think he might’ve gone down there?”

“Thanks,” Sora grins, putting the jacket back on and grabbing his ushanka from the dresser to plop on his head. “It’s the only place I can really think of right now. I doubt he went back to his house.”

“Yeah,” Kairi agrees, heading down the stairs and grabbing the monkey wrench that she left on the kitchen table. She’d rather not have to explain why she left that lying around to Sora’s parents, regardless if they’re acting normal or not. “I wouldn’t if I were him. Not alone, at least.” She frowns, “Though I guess Riku is dumb enough to want to do stuff alone.”

Sora tries to give her a reassuring smile. “All the more reason for us to find him then. Let’s go.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Riku sits on the flat roof of the workshop attached to his house, staring out at the endless sea of trees before him. He knew the train wouldn’t be there when he checked after leaving Sora’s and unfortunately confirming it didn’t do much to unravel the unease that’s tense in his gut.

His house is one of the highest points in town. He has to be able to see something from here.

He stands and moves towards the sloped roof of the actual house. He’s careful as he climbs it, digging his fingers and boots into the spaces where he pulled off shingles ages ago in order to create makeshift holds to get to the top with.

He comes up here sometimes, usually when he’s sad or angry and doesn’t want to talk about it. Everything feels clearer up here – the sky is closer, the air is cooler, the forest is less foreboding. He wishes it would feel like that now.

He grabs hold of the chimney and hauls himself up, once again grateful that his father blocked this old one up when they put in a new fireplace years ago. It gives him a mostly flat perch to sit on, the true peak of this hill. But even standing he can already tell.

He’s not high enough.

The thick folded piece of paper in his jacket pocket is starting to jab at his side uncomfortably. He wishes he had time to copy it down, make it smaller, but it took long enough just to wait for his dad to leave the workshop so he could get in and get out unnoticed. He knows he’s going to have to see his parents at some point today, but he’d rather put that off until he thinks of a good excuse to be staying at Sora’s for god knows how long. For now, he’s happy to stay unknown and unnoticed.

He’s getting antsy though, aggravated, and the trip down is always noisier than the trip up. He sighs, looking back towards town. He know what he has to do.

Taking one last deep breath of fresh air, he hops off the chimney and starts his trek to the highest point in town.

 

~ ~ ~

 

“We’ve looked everywhere, Sora,” Kairi pants, exhausted. They’ve covered the entirety of the area surrounding the train tracks twice, checking every place that doesn’t have them going into the woods. After their talk, they’re both a little wary about accidentally instigating any townsfolk into poking their noses into whatever they’re up to.

“Where else are we supposed to check, then?” Sora asks, starting to get worried. He doesn’t know if it’s all the talk or the lack of sleep or the incident with his parents this morning, but yesterday he felt completely normal and now he’s starting to feel like he’s fraying at the seams.

“First,” Kairi says, stepping towards him and taking his gloved hands in her own. “We’re going to breathe. It’s not like you to freak out.”

“Yeah, well, we don’t normally deal with stuff this freaky,” he huffs, but he knows she’s right. This really is unlike him. But the thought of being like something else, like whatever got into his parents’ only makes his fear grow.

“I can see you thinking, you know,” she pouts. “It’s plain as day on your face.”

He sighs. He needs to think of something else. He looks around the area, looking for anything to take his mind off what’s going on right now. “You know,” he starts, stepping back and taking Kairi with him, moving until they’re on either side of the lone set of tracks. “The day we found you, we were lining pennies along the track.”

Kairi tilts her head. “Pennies?”

“Yeah,” Sora grins. “Wakka had told me about how you can put coins on the track and when the train comes it flattens them out. Pretty cool shit when you’re four, you know? But I really wanted to see the train myself so we were hiding in the bushes, as if the train could see us, but then it was getting late and Riku wanted to go home and he went to leave and I tried to stop him and then all the sudden-“ Sora stops himself midsentence, grinning at Kairi’s obvious interest in the story. “We heard it.”

Kairi’s eyes widen. “The train?”

Sora nods. “The train. We were only turned around for second but when we looked back… There you were,” Sora gestures to a spot on the ground next to where Kairi is standing with his chin. “But the train wasn’t there.”

“Sora…” Kairi trails, worry lingering in her voice. “That’s- That’s not normal. Trains can’t just disappear like that.”

“I know,” he answers but his eyes are glazed now, distant. “We knew it wasn’t, but whenever any of the adults asked us questions we just said that we found you there. We never mentioned the train. Heh. I wonder why.”

“Sora?”

“Why do you think that is, Kairi?” Sora asks seriously, looking her dead in the eye. “Why have we never questioned any of this stuff before? Why does Riku bring this up once and now it feels like I’m stuck in a nightmare?”

“ _Hey_ ,” Kairi says sternly, her voice low. “None of that talk. Riku is the one having nightmares here; we’re living the same life we’ve been living. And I don’t have any answers, okay? But I have questions too.”

“You do?” Sora breathes. He’s almost relieved. It makes it feel less like he’s going crazy.

“Sora, I am always cold,” she states factually. “In the middle of summer, when I’m next to a fire, when I’m bundled up in my warmest winter clothes – I’ve filled up the tub before with steaming water and even when my whole body is in it, it feels like there’s ice stuck in my chest that never thaws. It only spreads. And I’ve never had an answer for that. Whenever I tell Cid he tells me I probably just have a head cold. When I’ve gone to the doctor, he said it’s probably just allergies. But no one ever checks. There’s no test, no thermometers, everyone just brushes it off. But I know what I’m feeling, I know this isn’t normal. What if it’s connected? What if I can find out _why_? What if I-“ she cuts herself off, taking a deep breath to calm herself down. There’s no use in getting worked up, in getting her hopes up too high. “What if I can find out where I’m from?”

Now Sora feels bad for getting so worked up. If his friends want – _need_ – answers, then so does he. “Let’s go find Riku-“

There’s something in forest. They hear it as a snapping twig, the rustling of bushes, before a strong gust of wind rattles what sounds like all the branches in the entire woods.

“Sora!” Kairi gasps and he leaps over the tracks, tugging her away from the trees and the rails. “There’s something in there. Sora, I swear I saw something in there!” She grapples for the heavy wrench sticking out of her jacket pocket.

“What are you gonna do with that?!” Sora asks in a mixture of fear and exasperation, eyes frantically scanning the woods for whatever Kairi saw-

They both see it. A split second, but it’s there for certain. In the inky wriggling shadows cast by the swaying trees they see it – a flash of glowing yellow, a pair of them, shaped like eyes.

“Come out here and get what’s coming to ya!” Kairi yells like a battle cry, her teeth gritted as she winds the wrench back in both hands like a baseball bat.

For second, it seems like it might take up her challenge. The wind starts to blow again, the gusts harsh enough that they’re forced to shield their eyes. And just like that, it stops.

They blink and everything is back to how it was before, everything around them unnaturally still.

“Riku?” Sora asks quietly, as if raising his voice would call whatever it was back again.

Kairi nods. “Riku.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Riku looks up when he hears footsteps coming from down the road, pushing himself up from the porch step once he confirms who it is. “About time you guys showed up,” he calls and the pair immediately start running towards him.

“You jerk!” Sora yells in way of greeting, hitting Riku with a weak punch. “We looked everywhere for you, why the heck are you back here?!”

Riku rolls his eyes. “I told you guys I would be back.”

Sora pouts, “I don’t care that that’s true, I’m still mad. We had to climb the hill to your house _and_ talk to your mom – who seems very unworried about you missing all day and just wants to know if you’ll be home for dinner, by the way, and-“

“We saw something in the woods,” Kairi cuts in, getting straight to the point.

Riku’s face loses any positive expression it held, now tense and seemingly determined. “You went to the train,” he states.

Sora’s brows knit together, “How did you know that?”

“I need to show you guys something,” he says without preamble, walking past them back the way they came.

Kairi sighs, turning around to follow. “You boys are too active.”

“Where are we going?” Sora questions, trying to stay between Kairi and Riku until they match their paces better.

“Highest point in town,” Riku answers, but doesn’t say anything more. None of them do, not while they walk through town. Destiny Forge might be a small community, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t people milling about and the more people around only means the higher the risk of any word being overheard getting turned into gossip. They don’t need to take any chances, not before they know what they’re getting into.

The water tower stands at the northernmost point of town and it can be seen no matter where you’re standing. It’s that fact that makes both Sora and Kairi wary when Riku immediately grabs hold of the rungs and starts what is undoubtedly a very long ladder climb up to the top.

“I’ve already done this once today,” Riku calls once he’s a couple feet up in the air. “It’s not that bad, just don’t look down. And really, Sora, I didn’t think _you’d_ be the one to wuss out.”

Sora knows he’s being goaded. “Dammit!” he yells and grabs hold of the ladder and starts climbing. Just because he knows he’s being goaded doesn’t mean he won’t still fall for it.

Kairi sighs in resignation and follows him up. “One of you is definitely going to have to carry me home,” she warns. The weighty wrench still in her jacket isn’t helping.

Riku was right. While the few minute climb wasn’t nearly as bad as they thought it would be, it’s still too much effort to be welcome after all the running around they’ve done today. Still, the view might be the most breathtaking thing they’ve ever seen here.

“It’s beautiful…” Kairi breathes, looking over the spread-out sprawling expanse of land their town covers. “It doesn’t seem like it’s that big when we’re just walking around every day.”

“Well, a lot of that over there is farmland, and we don’t usually go out that way,” Sora points out, the pair looking to the eastern portion of town. “So, what are we-“ he turns around and Riku is gone. “Riku?!”

“Over here, loud mouth.” Riku waves them over from the side and continues to walk until they’re facing south. “You know, the whole town probably just heard you.”

Kairi giggles, “Then they won’t think anything is out of the ordinary if he’s just calling for you.” Sora pouts, crossing his arms and looking down so the redness in his cheeks is less noticeable. The slight flush brightening Riku’s face doesn’t escape her notice, either. “So, why are we up here?” she asks, finishing Sora’s earlier question and breaking their embarrassed tension.

Riku clears his throat. “Right. So I noticed something when I was up here earlier.”

“Why were you up here, anyways?” Sora questions.

Riku doesn’t answer. He sticks his arm out over the railing keeping them all from toppling off of tower, pointing to various places in town that act like landmarks for the locals. “There’s the square, there’s that dried up well, there’s the graveyard, and _that_ ,” Riku points, his tone dropping into something more serious, “is where the tracks are.”

Sora follows the line of his finger to the center of an endless cluster of trees a little ways from town. He squints in confusion. “But the tracks… the tracks are in a clearing.”

“I know. So how come we can see it when we’re down there, but not when we’re up here?”

“That’s… not possible,” Kairi says, shaking her head. “How is that even possible?”

“I don’t know,” Riku admits.

“Could the tracks be somewhere else? Like, are you _sure_ that’s where they are?” But even as he’s asking, Sora knows that’s where they are, that’s why Riku pointed out everything else. He was mapping their proximity.

“It’s there,” Riku states in a way that leaves no room for argument. “I’m sure of it.”

Sora looks up at Riku, at the focused look on his face that’s managed to pinpoint the exact location of the tracks despite the hundreds of other trees in the area. “Can you hear the train?” he asks again, fingers curling around the railing.

Riku hesitates before offering a short nod. “Yeah. I can.”

“How…” Kairi asks without it really being a question.

Riku shrugs. “I don’t know. It started a few weeks before the nightmares. It’s like… a sound, but I can feel it.” He looks down at his hands, curling his fingers into fists then stretching them out. “It never comes more than twice a day. It always comes in the early morning. The other times, it’s always at sunset. Whatever is going on here,” he turns to face his friends, both of them just as serious as he is about this, “I think the train has something to do with it.”

Kairi folds her arms, hugging herself to brace against the cooler winds the altitude brings. “Do you think it has answers?”

Riku closes his eyes and shrugs again. “Honestly? I have no idea. But I don’t know where else to start. We have the woods and we have the train. That’s not a lot to go on.”

“Riku,” Sora interrupts, catching his attention. “You’re still staying at my place, right?”

He nods, “That was the plan.”

Sora nods too. “Okay then. Kai, Riku is gonna help me with my deliveries as long as he’s staying at my house.”

“Oh, working for room and board, I see,” Kairi teases, pleased when she manages to lighten the atmosphere enough for them to crack a smile.

“Gotta use him for something,” Sora laughs, yelping when Riku pinches his arm. He rubs the sore spot but keeps looking at Kairi. “We’ll stop by the garage afterwards and then regroup back at my house.”

Kairi tilts her head, but Riku is the one to question him. “What for?”

Sora grins, finally feeling a bit more confident now that they’re all together and on the same page. “To go search the woods, of course.”

Riku shakes his head again, but there’s no denying his smile. “We’re really doing this, huh? You sure you two wanna get involved in this? There’s still time to back out.”

“Of course we do!” Sora answers easily, folding his hands behind his head and rolling his eyes like it was a stupid question.

“We got involved the second we became friends,” Kairi adds. She pulls one of her gloves off, extending her pinkie between the two of them. “And as friends, we’re going to stick together. We’re going to get answers.”

“We’re going to solve the mystery,” Sora happily joins in, hooking his own pinkie with hers. They both look up at Riku.

“No matter what happens,” Riku starts, matching their determination with his own. “We stick together until the end.” He pulls off his glove and joins their pinkies with his own. “That’s our oath.”


	6. Chapter 6

It only takes two knocks against the door before Kairi answers, a thicker coat on than what she’s been wearing lately and the heavy wrench still in her hand.

“Please tell me you’re not still planning on threatening me,” Sora winces. He saw the way Kairi was using that yesterday and the thought of her doing that to him at Cid’s command is wholly unpleasant.

“Oh, I’ll be threatening someone,” she says seriously, stepping outside and closing the door behind her. She gives Sora a wink. “But it won’t be you, so don’t worry.”

“I’m still worried,” Sora sighs as he hops down the porch step to the small gravel driveway and makes his way back out to the street.

Riku and Kairi follow. “Are you done with your deliveries?” she asks, eyeing the bag on Sora’s shoulder that doesn’t seem to be empty yet.

Sora grins, “Just gotta finish up this street, then I’m done! You and Riku can go on ahead, I’ll catch up!” Without waiting for an answer, he takes off jogging down the street, already fishing out the envelopes for the first mailbox.

“Shall we?” Riku offers his arm to Kairi, giving her a soft tired smile.

She giggles and links her arm with his own. “We shall.” She leans her head against his shoulder as they start the walk through town that will lead them to Sora’s house, moving closer and eventually holding the proffered limb with her other hand, too. Even with both their jackets in the way, she clings to the slight warmth Riku’s arm provides. “So, how was it spending the night while fully conscious, huh? Did you two share the same bed?”

Riku scowls, but it doesn’t deter the redness from flooding his cheeks. “Kairi-“

“He’ll never figure it out if you don’t tell him,” she hums. They’ve had this conversation too many times already and Kairi is starting to grow impatient.

Riku sighs, “Kai, it’s… it’s not that easy.”

“It really is, Ri,” she responds easily. They stop when they hear footsteps pounding the asphalt behind them, turning to see Sora out of breath and waving to them from down the road. Kairi sighs, knowing this chat of theirs is over.

“For your information,” Riku chimes in to Kairi’s surprise. The flush hasn’t left his face. “We did share the bed.”

Kairi’s eyes light up. Sure, it isn’t confessing, but with these two idiots she keeps as her best friends she thinks any progress is major progress. She laughs, “Boys are so dumb.”

“Hey, I wanna join!” Sora shouts, throwing his arms over the pair’s shoulders as he leaps towards their backs. They stumble forward, but manage not to fall. He lets go and circles around to Kairi’s other side, hooking his arm with hers. “You still cold?”

She nods, tucking her chin further into the safety of her scarf. “I think it’s getting colder outside, too.”

Riku nods. “Definitely feels like it. It’s like we’re moving into winter months ahead of schedule.” He glances down at Kairi, “Are you gonna be okay going out into the-“ he stops himself before he says it, suddenly hyperaware of everyone in town. He swears it feels like they’re being watched. He clears his throat, “It’s only going to get colder where there’s shade,” he finishes.

Kairi nods, catching on. “I won’t let you two go without me. You guys are always doing fun stuff on your own whenever Cid has me stuck down at the garage. Not this time. I won’t let you leave me behind. Besides,” she adds, voice and gaze lowering, “This has to do with me, too. I… I need answers, maybe even more than you do.”

“Right,” Riku agrees without argument.

“Don’t worry, Kai,” Sora grins, leaning forward so he can catch her attention. “We’ll definitely find the answers you need, no doubt about it.”

She nods again. “Right. I’m counting on you two, so you better count on me, too.”

“You’ve got the best arm in town,” Riku chuckles as they turn down the side street that leads out of the main part of town and towards the more spread out area where Sora lives. “Of course we’re counting on you.”

They unlink their arms when Sora’s house comes into view, Kairi hurrying to get out of the cold and the boys picking up speed to catch up to her. “I’ll make hot chocolate,” Sora announces before Kairi can ask, smiling at her sigh of relief. “You can wait up in my room. I got the fluffy blanket out of the closet just for you.”

Kairi wraps him in a tight hug of gratitude. “You’re the best,” she says seriously, though Sora only laughs in response. She turns around to give Riku a look, one he isn’t particularly fond of (except he is, really, because it’s hers). “You can stay to help Sora carry the mugs up,” she grins, skipping up the stairs before either of them can respond.

Riku sighs while Sora shrugs, both of them moving into the kitchen. “You think we’ll end up finding anything out there?” Sora asks, getting out the pot and the milk and emptying the bottle into it.

Riku turns the knob on the stove before opening the pantry and taking out the tin of cocoa mix, pulling open a drawer and fishing out a spoon. “I don’t know. I don’t even know if I should be hoping we find anything.”

Sora raises a brow and leans back against the counter. “What do you mean?”

Riku presses his lips in a tight line as he spoons the mixture into the pot, handing Sora a wooden spoon to stir it with. “I mean… What if whatever these nightmares I’ve been having, what if they’re like, I don’t know, a sign of what’s out there? Do we really _want_ to encounter something like that? Kairi said you two saw something out there yesterday, right? What was that like?”

Sora purses his lips, thinking back on yesterday’s experience. “It all… happened really quickly,” he says, watching as the powder melts into the milk and changes color. “Like, we only saw it for a second maybe, but it looked like… eyes, I guess? They were yellow and glowing and in the shadow of the trees, but like… It was definitely there. And then the wind started blowing so hard we couldn’t keep our eyes open and when it stopped nothing was there. It was… really _really_ weird.”

Riku nods, mostly to himself, as he goes over to the spice rack. He plucks the bottle of cayenne from the holder, unscrewing the top and adding a pinch of it to the pot. He catches Sora’s curious glance at the bottle and he shrugs, “Might help her warm up more.” He moves to put the bottle back, less out of necessity and more as an excuse to face away from him. “But the eyes you’re talking about… I think I’ve seen them, too.”

Sora turns off the stove, scooting the pot to the other side. “When,” he asks, serious and not much of a question.

Riku stares at the sink, taking a breath before turning around. “The other night, when I came here. I thought I saw something glowing out in the storm, right after I passed the tracks. The second I saw it, the storm suddenly got worse and this,” he taps the still swollen mark on his cheek, “happened.” The bruising is starting to fade from the rest of his face, but the area around the healing cut is still violet and red. “It’s like nature’s against us,” he mutters, moving to grab cups from the cabinet behind him.

“You really think so?” Sora questions quietly, taking a mug and filling it up. “Don’t really know how to fight nature.”

“We don’t really know how to fight at all,” Riku points out. He takes the other two mugs once their filled and starts walking towards the stairs. “Guess there’s no time like the present, though.”

Sora moves ahead of him once they’re in the upstairs hallway, opening the door to the bedroom.

“Is there a reason this is here?” Kairi asks as soon as the door is open, sitting on the floor in front of the bag Riku brought over the night before with an axe in her hands and fuzzy blanket over her shoulders.

“Didn’t realize you were a snoop,” Riku taunts, handing her the mugs to place on the floor before he joins her on the ground as well.

“I saw the handle sticking out of your bag, I had to see if you actually brought it,” she pouts, carefully placing the tool back in the bag.

Riku holds a hand out to hold Sora’s mug as he sits, picking up his own and taking a sip of it. “You’re not the only one who carries a weapon.”

“Weapons?” Sora repeats, downing a large gulp of the steaming liquid. His family runs the post office, they don’t have any tools around that he can use for a weapon. He gasps suddenly, putting his mug back down and flopping over on his belly, crawling towards his bed. He reaches underneath it and feels around until he emerges with his new hockey stick, holding it above his head proudly in the air.

“Didn’t you learn your lesson last time?” Riku sighs, shaking his head.

Sora pouts, throwing the stick up on his bed before going back to his previous spot. “Well sorry I don’t have a giant shed full murder utensils.”

“Riku could probably make you something. Like a bat, maybe?” Kairi says, thinking. “It’s probably less likely to break on a badger, at least. Oh! Or maybe I can steal a crowbar from the garbage! I think we have a few of them lying around.”

“It’ll be fine,” Sora brushes off. “I definitely won’t break my hockey stick this time.”

“Famous last words,” Riku mumbles under his breath, chuckling when Kairi slaps his arm for it. “Anyways, we’re here to regroup, right? Let’s get on with it.”

“Well,” Sora starts, slightly sheepish. “I guess I did say that, but…”

“What exactly do we have to go over?” Kairi finishes, setting her already drained mug on the ground.

Riku gives her his own mostly filled cup and she gladly accepts it, sipping at the sweet and spicy concoction with glee. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a thick sheet of folded paper, opening it up and smoothing it out in the space between the three of them. “I took this from the workshop,” he explains.

Kairi and Sora lean in, looking over what appears to be a map of Destiny Forge. They whole town is on it, all of it surrounded by a thick border of crosshatched green that they assume is to mark the forest. It’s almost unsettling how it reaches to the very edges of the page.

“Uh, no offense, Riku,” Sora starts, giving his friend a skeptical look. “But we kind of already know our way around town.”

Riku rolls his eyes and flicks Sora on the forehead, cause him to recoil so he’s not hovering over the map anymore. “It’s not for that, dumbass,” he scoffs. He points to the various lines and numbers marking the the inner edges of the forest on the sheet. “It’s meant for tracking where we log. We mark down were we’ve cut so we don’t go back to the same place and waste time going where there’s nothing for us to chop down.”

“Your dad made this?” Kairi asks, something strange in her voice. Riku nods. “And these numbers,” her finger points at the inked scrawl that’s written in-between marked off sections right at the start of the lines of greenery. “These correspond with months?” Another nod. Kairi sits back on her feet, shaking her head. “How have we never noticed,” she mutters under breath, her teeth starting to scrape at her lip.

Sora looks between the two in confusion. “Wait, what? The numbers are months, so what?”

“These numbers,” Riku explains, his finger making a circle that follows the line of the tree border. “They add up to a year. We’ve followed this pattern every year, without fail, for as long as I can remember.”

Sora knits his brows. “So?”

“Trees don’t grow back in a year, Sora,” Kairi explains as simply as she can. “Not the kind in the forest, not any that are that tall. It’s not possible.”

Sora’s eyes widens and he looks to Riku. “Wait, so how long is it from when you cut them down to when they start growing? You don’t, like, replant them, right?”

Riku shakes his head. “We don’t and I don’t know. I’ve never even _seen_ any of the trees around here growing. All I know is that one day we cut them down and the next time I remember seeing them it’s like we never cut anything down at all. What I do know, though,” he taps a section to the southwest of town, one without any markings on it, “is that we never go logging by the tracks. Never.”

“This is why you were looking,” Sora figures out. “This is how you knew we wouldn’t be able to see it from the water tower.”

“I remembered yesterday, after I went to the tracks myself. It’s like I noticed for the first time we never go down there to work. After I checked the map, I knew I had to look,” Riku confirms. “I don’t have any explanation for it, for any of this. But I know what I saw, what we all saw, and I know the parts of my memory that are true. Right now, we’re logging around here,” he points to the section to the east, near the farmland. “As long as we stay away from there, I think we should be safe. My family and the farmers are the only ones consistently near the woods. If anyone else spots us, we’ll know we’re being followed.”

“Or that whatever got into my parents got into somebody else,” Sora mutters.

“Speaking of,” Kairi cuts in, looking at Riku strangely, “what did yours say? About staying over here and all?”

Something dark flashes over Riku’s face before he straightens up. He scratches at his left wrist, avoiding eye contact. “I told them Sora needed help reroofing, in case another storm comes,” he says, voice distant, almost like it’s rehearsed. “They said it’s fine. To come home whenever the job is finished up.”

Kairi’s face scrunches in confusion. “That… That’s it?”

“Yep,” Riku drawls.

“They didn’t even ask what happened to your face?” Kairi pushes. There’s no way his parents wouldn’t be worried after seeing that. Riku looks at her and she can place it now, the lingering hurt in his eyes. She knows the answer.

“It’s like they forgot I existed until they saw me again,” he says stiffly. He turns to Sora, a knowing look on his face. “Remember when we went into the post this morning, how your parents acted like it was totally normal for me to be doing deliveries with you? How your mom didn’t even notice that it’s weird for you to already have your mail bag?”

“Yeah…” Sora trails. Sure, he thought it was a bit out of the ordinary, but they weren’t making those creepy faces again so he didn’t think much on it.

“They were like that. All “welcome home, do you want dinner?” without even asking where I was all day or what happened. They didn’t even bat an eye when they watched me bring my axe into the house.” Sora pats his knee and he takes the comfort for what it is. This interaction has been eating at the back of his mind since last night and despite any distress he’s feeling, he’s just glad to be getting it out of his system. “Right before I left they told me “be sure to stay close to town, wouldn’t want anything to find you.””

The room is silent, the three of them reeling from the impact of those words.

“Whatever’s out there,” Sora says, easing through the tense atmosphere. “We can take it.”

Riku smiles despite himself. “What are you saying? Of course we can.”

Kairi nods, “We’ll have each other’s backs no matter what.”

“So then,” Sora stands, grabbing his hockey stick from the bed. “Where do we start?”

Riku picks up the map, folding it up and shoving it back in his pocket before he answers. “The most obvious spot.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Despite the clear skies stretching over Destiny Forge, the trio can tell immediately when they look into the forest that the light in there is dim at best.

“Maybe we should bring a flashlight next time,” Kairi suggests, stepping on the track. She feels like she should feel something, like being in direct contact with the path that brought her here should tell her something. Instead, all she feels is the bubbling nervousness in her chest that comes with what they’re about to do.

“Sounds like a good idea,” Sora seconds. He stays standing behind Kairi, watching as Riku ends up being the first of them to make it past the tracks and to the tree line.

“You two just gonna stand there and wait for someone to catch us?” Riku calls. His grip on the axe in his hand tightens as he faces them, taking a step backwards. He’s officially in the woods. “Thought we were sticking together,” he goads. It’s better if they all just take the leap and deal with what happens when it happens.

Kairi’s hands twist around the handle of her wrench as she steels herself, her and Sora running towards Riku at the same time. “We should get out of sight of the clearing,” she says, looking at the bright light just a few feet from where they are under the shade of the trees.

“Then let’s get moving,” Riku nods and leads the way for the others. They stay close together as they walk through the woods, flinching at all the little sounds around them. The snapping of twigs, the rustling of branches, the crunch of dead leaves beneath their boots – despite being sounds that are completely normal when they walk through town, commonplace even, it feels entirely different when they hear it out here.

Kairi ducks behind the boys when the wind starts blowing, tucking her scarf tighter around her face. She refuses to be beat by something as dull as the cold. Even with her determination, though, she swears she can feel the temperature dropping by the minute.

“Have you seen anything?” Sora asks, startled when the trees echo his voice across the forest, the sound warping the farther away it gets. “Well… that was unsettling,” he mumbles and swears he hears it repeated like a whisper in his ear. He rubs at it, huddling in closer to Riku and Kairi.

“Haven’t seen anything, but…” Riku answers, voice low. He stops walking. They must be deep in the forest by now. He doesn’t know how long they’ve been walking for, not when they’ve been moving so slowly, cautious with every step. They lost the clearing a while ago, though, and have been moving in a straight line away from it since.

Sora raises an eyebrow. “What-“ He’s cut off Riku wraps his arm around him so his hand can cover Sora’s mouth, forcing him to be quiet. He squirms, trying to get free to no avail.

Riku closes his eyes, trying to get his other senses to sharpen into something more useful for the situation. “Do you hear something?”

Sora and Kairi stop moving, heart rates spiking as they try to listen for whatever Riku is hearing. The woods are silent around them, the wind dying down until the air is still.

Kairi frowns. “I don’t know, maybe? It almost sounds like-“

They hear it. Very clear. Very, very close.

Sora swallows against the lump in his throat. “Growling.”

They turn around to see them. A pack of wolves, larger than the ones they’ve ever seen in books. They’re dark grey with fur bristling along their spines, teeth too sharp to be anything natural and a gleaming white that almost seems to emit light with their brightness. Their growling turns to snarling, their eyes black and trained on the trio as they close in.

“Run,” Riku whispers and they don’t need to be told twice.

The three sprint off in the same direction they’ve been heading, adrenaline forcing their feet to move faster than they’ve ever had to. They do their best to not lose speed, jumping over overgrown roots that try to trip them and dodging low hanging branches, but their panic induced flight has them too focused on the sound of scraping claws and gnashing jaws behind them to pay full attention to what’s ahead of them.

It’s Riku that falls first. His foot trips over a rock buried in the rotting foliage and sends him crashing to the ground. He catches himself just enough to flip his body over quickly, his knee pulling back to his chest before he sends his boot straight into the grating muzzle of one of the animals. It lets out a sharp cry then a whimper as it crashes into another, but he doesn’t sit around to watch. He gets to his feet as fast as he can, boots sliding on the leaves and moss as he tries to regain his momentum.

“Are you oka-“ Sora starts to ask through panted breath before he goes down himself. He looks back to see his boot snagged in an upended root, jammed tight enough through the opening that he can’t pull it loose.

“Worry about yourself, yeah?” Riku grits out. He already has the axe raised above his head and slams it down once, twice before the root severs from the tree.

Kairi pulls Sora to his feet, dragging him behind her as they continue running. The wolves aren’t giving up, the sound of angry growls still loud and clear behind them. She tries to dodge past a branch hanging in her way, but she doesn’t move far enough to the side. She feels it split through the meat of her cheek, sucking in a sharp breath and wincing in pain at the burning sensation. She refuses to let it slow her down.

“Up ahead,” she gasps. Her lungs are in agony, the cold air stinging with each breath she takes, but there’s light ahead which means they’re close to the tree line.

With escape in sight, they somehow manage to push their bodies harder, leaping out into the daylight that signals the end of the woods. The terrain isn’t unfamiliar enough, though.

“The- the farms?” Sora pants, barely able to speak let alone breathe. He can see the water tower in the distance, can see a barn and tractor even closer, and someone farming out in the fields even closer than that. He stares in disbelief at the stacks of large hay bales in front of them. “How did we-“

Riku yanks Sora down to where he and Kairi are sitting already, hiding on the ground behind the hay bales. He slaps his hand tightly over Sora’s mouth, holding him close so he can’t wiggle away. Sora’s eyes go wide as he sees where they’re looking.

The wolves are pacing back and forth, staring them down from the tree line but not venturing out of the forest. It’s with a final vicious snarl that they turn away, disappearing into the shadows and out of sight.

Sora breathes in relief as Riku’s hand falls away. “That was close.” He feels Riku tense behind him, his body rigid and unmoving. “Riku?”

“Is that your dad?” Kairi asks, peering out a little ways down the tree line, too close for comfort.

Riku swallows and nods. “Yeah. That’s him.” It’s not like it could be anyone else. His dad is the only other person aside from himself that chops lumber from the tree line. “We need to get out of here.”

They all agree, sneaking their way past the farm’s plot of land and trying to get to town as fast as they can once they pass it. They don’t relax until they’re back in the sanctity of Sora’s house and the brunette is glad for once that his parents only ever seem to come home to sleep. The walk up the stairs feels like it takes ages and the second they get into the bedroom he collapses.

“I never want to move again,” Sora groans into the rug he’s face down in, unable to muster the will to roll over.

“Me neither,” Kairi agrees and wants to go sit on the bed but is stopped when Riku grabs her arm. He taps his uninjured cheek and when she twitches her own she’s reminded of the cut, the pain shooting through her face at the movement not keen on letting her forget. “Is it bad?” she hisses through gritted teeth.

“Not as bad as mine,” Riku chuckles, leading her to the bathroom down the hall where the first aid kit is.

She sighs, “That’s not reassuring at all.”

“It bled a lot, so it probably looks worse than it actually is,” he says and she’s able to confirm that as soon as she looks in the mirror. There’s dried blood covering her entire cheek and curving under chin, the worst of it thick and a deep crimson where she assumes the actual cut is.

Riku holds out a washcloth. “It’s probably better if you’re the one to clean it. I’ll dress it.”

She nods and turns on the faucet, letting the water get hot as she takes the washcloth from his hand. “It doesn’t look bruised, at least,” she mumbles, pulling her gloves off.

He chuckles, crouching down to grab the first aid kit from under the sink. “I told you it wasn’t as bad as mine.”

“The only thing that could look worse than yours would involve bone sticking out.” She wets the washcloth and starts wiping away the blood furthest from the cut first.

“Gee,” Riku deadpans as he stands and puts the container on the counter. “Thanks. Nice to know my current appearance is at that level.”

Kairi smirks, wincing a bit. “Hey, I said that would be worse, so don’t worry. You’re slightly above that level.”

He flips the lid opens and starts looking for some cotton swabs and a bottle of alcohol. “I’m flattered,” he chuckles. He looks up when she hisses again as she starts dabbing at the wound. “Here, let me see.” He takes off his gloves and jacket, tossing them over the edge of the tub, and gently grips her chin so he can turn her head to face him. “Doesn’t look that deep,” he surmises. He takes the washcloth and holds it under the hot water for a few seconds before squeezing the excess out. “Hold it over the cut for a minute or two. It’ll make it easier to wipe everything off.”

She nods and presses it to her cheek, sucking her teeth at the harsh sting. They pass a few moments in silence before a fear creeps up from the back of her mind, one she’s been thinking about since this morning. “What… what do I tell Dad, if he asks?” she asks quietly. It isn’t often that she refers to him like that, not when she’s not speaking directly to him. She knows he’s not her parent, that he only took her in because he had the space and was one of the few people in town with no one else around, but he’s the only parent she’s able to remember. If she loses the one piece of family she can claim, she doesn’t know what she’ll do.

Riku takes the washcloth from her, trying to be gentle as he wipes away the remaining residue. “Just tell him what happened.” He soaks a cotton ball with alcohol and dabs it along the cut.

Her gasp turns into a yelp and she instinctually steps away from the cause of pain, flinching when her head hits the doorframe behind her. “I’m supposed to tell him that – OW – I went into the woods a-and – AAH – got hit in the face with a-“ she grabs Riku’s wrist, forcing him to stop. “Got hit in the face with a tree while I was running from wolves?”

Riku snorts and overpowers her grip on him to finish cleaning the injury. “No. You tell him that a branch caught you off guard. There are more trees in town than just the ones on the outskirts. The one at the pond, for example. Perfect excuse.”

She frowns. “Do you really think he’ll buy that?”

Folding a piece of gauze in half, he has Kairi hold it in place while he tapes it down. “The best lies are always the ones with a hint of truth to them,” he advises seriously before he starts to smirk. “Besides, Cid’ll believe anything you tell him.”

Well, she knows that much is true. She smiles at him and points to her cheek, “You know, if this ends up scarring we’ll be twins.”

Riku laughs suddenly, surprised. “Are you saying that because you know it will make Sora jealous?”

She gives him an exaggerated wink, spinning on her heel and walking back out to the hall. “Maybe,” she singsongs. She gets a glance at the sky through the window at the end of the hall, the oranges and reds a clear sign of sunset. “Oh, I didn’t realize it was this late already.” She watches Riku put away the kit, pausing in his movements as he seems to perk up at something before continuing like nothing happened.

He grabs his clothes from the tub and flips off the bathroom light, following her down the hall. “Do you want me to walk you home?”

They reach the bedroom and look inside, Sora now passed out where he laid on the floor. “I think someone else needs your assistance a bit more,” Kairi giggles. She pats his shoulder before she heads for the stairs. “Thanks for the help. Have fun snuggling together!”

“ _Goodbye, Kairi_ ,” Riku yells loudly after her, only hearing the sound of laughter and the slam of the front door in response.

He sighs, walking into the room and picking up Sora. It’s a hassle, but he gets him up on the bed, managing to get his shoes and jacket off before getting him under the dozen blankets he leaves piled on the bed. Riku sighs and looks at him, Kairi’s words playing on loop in his head, but it isn’t long before he gives in and gets under the covers as well.


	7. Chapter 7

Kairi is sitting on the step to her front porch when Sora and Riku go to get her the next morning. The tape holding the bandage to her face is starting to come loose, her blue eyes more vibrant because of how red-rimmed they are. She looks up at Riku and knows she doesn’t have to say it, knows that she can keep this to herself and maybe, just maybe, if she doesn’t admit it out loud that it will somehow not be true.

But their eyes meet and she knows he knows. She knows it’s not right to try to keep it a secret from them.

“He didn’t ask,” she says and her voice breaks with the confession. She’s spent too long crying over something so trivial already, but she can already feel the tears pooling in her eyes and threatening to spill over.

Before they have a chance to fall both boys are next to her, securing her in their warm embrace. She cries freely and they don’t notice when someone walks by and they don’t notice when they aren’t noticed, either.

Kairi feels like somehow, even if the world around her started falling to pieces, she would still be safe as long these two are with her. Even if Cid isn’t the same anymore, she knows the people beside her right now are her family.

The boys don’t move until she’s cried her heart out and even then they stick close to her side, a protective barrier keeping her from everything else until they get to Sora’s house. She’s still bone tired from the day before and the exhaustive sleep she eventually fell prey to was anything but restful. She collapses on Sora’s bed as soon as they enter the room, rolling herself in the large fluffy blanket on the very top and looking sideways at the other two as they watch her.

“I would ask if we could make this a nap day,” she starts, voice on the wrong side of hoarse, “but honestly I kinda wanna get back out there. Even if we did almost die yesterday.”

“That…” Sora shakes his head, sitting on the edge of the bed then laying back on Kairi’s legs. “That really did happen, huh,” he says, almost in awe. “Didn’t know wolves lived out here.”

“They don’t.”

Kairi and Sora both look to Riku, the oldest of them spreading out the logging map on the floor and studying it. “Would you like to continue that train of thought?” Kairi presses when he doesn’t say anything else.

“We’ve lived here our entire lives. You’ve been here for thirteen years of yours. Don’t you think that if there was a predatory animal that vicious living out there we would have heard something about it by now?” Riku asks, not looking up from the map. “Dead animals, an attack on a farmer, just someone mentioning that they saw some huge animal lurking in the woods – we’ve never heard any of that.”

“So where did they come from then?” Sora questions, not entirely buying Riku’s line of logic.

Riku furrows his brows, his fingers moving to rub at his forehead before stopping to scratch at his wrist. “I don’t know, but… It feels like I should.”

“I’m… not following,” Kairi admits, though she doesn’t think Sora is either.

Riku grunts in frustration. “I don’t- I don’t know how to explain it, it just feels like I’ve seen them before, but I haven’t. I know I haven’t.”

“Do you think,” Sora cuts in, weighing his words, “it could be related to the nightmares?”

Closing his eyes, Riku takes a deep breath, trying to force the tension out of his body with the exhale. “Something like that,” he sighs, rubbing at his eyes. “That’s probably the closest example I could give. It doesn’t matter, though.”

“It… doesn’t?” Sora repeats skeptically.

Riku shakes his head. “The animals didn’t appear until we were deep into the woods and from what we can see on this map, the woods to the south reach further than the ones to the west or the north.”

“So if we go to where the woods are more thinned out,” Kairi joins in, letting her arms escape from the blanket’s confines and leaning off of the bed so she can get a better look at the paper, “then the chances of us running into them again are lower.”

Riku nods, “That’s the idea. Whether there’s any truth to it is another matter entirely, but-“

“Works for me,” Sora interrupts, sitting back up only to slide off the bed onto the floor. He crawls the short distance from the bed to the map, hovering over it. “So, where are the trees the thinnest?”

Riku runs his finger along the top edge of the map. “To the north, it looks like. I don’t know if there are mountain ranges that extend that way or what, but it’s one of the only points where the green doesn’t go off the edge of the paper.”

“So we’re going to the water tower again,” Sora nods, standing back up and managing to only wince slightly against the soreness lining his body.

Kairi reluctantly unravels herself from the warm blanket, taking Sora’s offered hand to pull herself to her feet. “Just don’t make me climb again and we’ll be fine.”

Riku chuckles, folding the map and sticking it in his bag at the foot of Sora’s bed. He grabs his axe and props it over his shoulder. “No promises.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

The tree line starts just a few feet away from where the pavement ends. It’s mid-morning when they arrive, bundled against the dropping temperature with makeshift weapons gripped ready in their hands. Despite the danger they know could be lurking just beyond the shadows, they don’t hesitate this time, the nervous buzzing in their blood only serving to push them forward into the woods.

The woods aren’t as dense on this side of town, the trees spaced out enough that rays of sunlight can pierce through the covering leaves and pine needles to create a guiding path along the forest floor. They follow the splotches of light on instinct, letting the trail steer them further away from town.

“Do you really think this is safe to follow?” Kairi finally asks after a while. There’s only trees surrounding them now. The forest is eerily quiet compared to yesterday. There’s no wind blowing, nothing swaying the trees or scurrying through the brush, the lack of leaves on the ground making it so their steps are nearly silent as their boots sink down into the damp soil.

“I don’t know about safe, but,” Riku starts to answer, looking over his shoulder to see the light trailing behind them still, “if we’re able to follow it back then we should end up where we started.”

“Uh, yeah,” Sora snorts, his hockey stick across his shoulders and wrists hooked over it. “That’s kinda how walking in a straight line works.”

“We walked straight south yesterday,” Kairi points out, “and we ended up east of town.”

Sora shrugs. “We were running. It would’ve been easy to get turned around. We could have accidentally switched directions before we even started running. We were walking for a long time, you know.”

Kairi bites her lip. “That’s true…” she gives before shaking her head. “Still. Something doesn’t seem right about how that all happened. Right, Riku?” There’s no reply. “Riku?”

Sora and Kairi stop walking, turning around to see Riku standing a few steps back. “Hey,” Sora calls, quirking his head to the side. “Riku, you okay?”

No response.

Riku’s brow is knitted tightly, eyes creased like he’s focusing on something.

“Riku?” Sora calls, worry starting to edge at his voice.

Riku closes his eyes, rubbing his forehead with his thumb and index finger. “Do you hear that?” he asks, low voice loud in the silence surrounding them.

“Not again,” Sora groans. He tries to listen in himself but can’t hear anything.

“Not growling,” Riku clarifies. He opens his eyes, looking around in attempt to pinpoint the origin. He starts walking, straying from the trail of sunlight as he moves through the woods. The other two chase after him.

“Where are you going?” Kairi asks on an exhale. She’s getting really tired off all this running.

“I hear something,” Riku states obviously, his eyes darting around to hear the sound.

“Yeah, well, I think you’re the only one.” Sora is still straining his ears, trying to hear _anything_ in the forest. “There’s nothing to-“ He cuts himself off when they suddenly arrive at the edge of a slope leading down to a valley, a loudly gurgling stream cutting through the center of it. “Hear…”

“Why couldn’t we hear that?” Kairi asks quietly, not to anyone in particular and not expecting an answer. She squints at the creek, something catching her eye. “What is that?”

Sora looks where she’s pointing and sees it too. There’s something gleaming beneath the water, mixed up with the stones at the bottom. There’s movement out of the corner of his eye. “Hey, wait!”

Kairi doesn’t listen, digging her boots into the soil and balancing herself as she half walks half slides down the slope to the water’s edge.

Riku’s eyes widen, alarm clear on his features. “Kairi, don’t!” He’s racing down after her, leaving Sora alone on higher ground.

Kairi’s leaning towards the water, her fingers outstretched to try and grab whatever’s in the creek. Riku grabs her other arm, ready to pull her back, but it’s too late.

Kairi’s fingers ghost the water.

The water turns black.

The sound of the stream grows significantly louder, like they’re standing next to waterfall instead a babbling brook. The water is rushing faster and looks like less water and more like ink now, thick and vicious and coating everything it touches in blackness.

Kairi reels back, shaking the liquid from her fingertips like it’s burning her. It doesn’t come off.

“What the hell just happened!?” Sora yells down at them, panic rising. He wonders if he should go down there too.

“Riku, the water’s rising!” Kairi cries in alarm as he pulls her away from the stream.

Riku glances over and curses under his breath. The shadowy waters lap at the banks until it spills over them, soaking the ground and ebbing towards the pair. They race to the bottom of the slope. “Sora, move!”

Sora dodges to the side, watching as Riku’s axe comes flying up the slope, spinning in the air and lodging itself firmly in the trunk of a tree. He drops his hockey stick and scrambles over to it, grabbing the handle and trying to pull it free to no avail. The blade is settled deep into the wood, unwilling to be loosened.

Riku crouches to ground, his arms held out behind him. “Get on.”

“What?” Kairi breathes, looking between Riku and the water. It’s getting closer and still rising.

“Can you climb the slope?” he yells back, knowing the answer. They don’t have time to waste.

“Dammit!” she cries, wrapping her arms around his neck in a stranglehold and her legs around his waist in a vice.

Riku rips his gloves off and shoves them into his pocket. “Hold on tight,” he grits through clenched teeth. He claws his fingers through the loose top layer of soil and into the compacted dirt beneath, digging the toes of his boots into the slope to do the same. He moves them as quickly as they can, a life spent climbing trees and up the sides of houses and roofs finally coming in handy. It’s a mixture of actual climbing and jumping, his screaming leg muscles pushing off any solid hold they come across to put more distance between them and the rising flood. Loose rocks threaten to fall in his grasp, but he tries not to hold on for long, prying his nails into dirt and grabbing any roots they find.

“Hurry!” Sora shouts at them, watching as the water fills up the valley they’re trying the escape, the water lapping at the Riku’s ankles.

They’re almost to the top. Riku grabs at a visible root, trying to pull them the rest of the way up.                 He can feel it the second it starts to give way, but there’s no where else to grab onto. The root rips from the slope wall and Riku frantically drags his fingers through the dirt, a cry unwillingly ripping from his throat as he can feel the soil pushing and threatening to tear his nails off.

The water is at his waist and covers Kairi’s legs and it’s so much heavier than water should be. He can feel it pulling them down, trying to drag them under.

He suddenly wonders if there’s something living just below the surface, blending with the inky waters, waiting for them. He jolts when he feels something wrap around his ankle and he doesn’t have to look to know that it’s there. To know that there’s two glowing yellow eyes glaring at them.

Pain shoots through his head like he’s been shot through the temples and they slide down the slope a little more, the water at his chest now and Kairi’s waist.

“ _Grab on!_ ”

Riku looks up to see the blade of the hockey stick right above his head, Sora’s gloveless hands gripping the other end as tightly as he can. He lets go of the slope and wraps both hands around the lifeline, feet kicking in the water to try to propel himself up.

Riku is heavy enough on his own, but with Kairi’s added weight Sora finds himself struggling to pull them out. But then he sees it.

Somehow, even while it blends with the water, there’s the form of something. It’s made out of writhing shadows, moving erratically like the rippling water, but it’s the flash of yellow with an eerie glow that kicks Sora’s adrenaline into high gear.

With strength he didn’t know he had, he starts stepping back and pulling them up by force. He pulls with everything in him, every fiber of his being screaming that he needs to pull them out before something happens, something _bad_ , something much worse than being chased by wolves.

Riku lets go when he reaches the top and Sora’s falls over without the counterweight. On trembling arms he lifts them over the edge, collapsing the second he has flat ground beneath him. Kairi’s limbs are stiff, her movements janky as she pries herself off of Riku and rolls off of him onto her back. Her chest rises and falls rapidly, desperately trying to catch her breath.

The water hasn’t stopped rising. She knows they can’t stay here.

“Guys,” Sora pants as soon as he sits up, panic fulling flooding his system. The water isn’t just rising anymore. It’s reeling back, forming itself into a wave ready to crash down on them.

The trio force themselves up on wobbly legs. Riku and Kairi are half coated in the ink-like water, their bodies almost appearing formless where the darkness covers. Riku huffs, body wracked with pain as he stumbles towards the tree his axe is in. Sora runs to Kairi, pulling her to her feet and helping her run away from the valley. Riku steadies his foot against the trunk of the tree and yanks the hatchet free with one rough stunted motion.

Wordlessly following the pair, they try to outrun tidal wave of shadows but it slams over them, the weight of the dense darkness hitting them with near concussive force.

They cling onto each other with everything they have, holding tight even as the waters try to push them apart. They’re washed away with the rushing current, lost in a darkness with no light, no sight.

Then, everything is bright.

Sora blinks a few times, forcing his eyes open and making them adjust to the sudden change. He lifts his head and looks around.

The woods are in front of him. The first line of trees are just barely out of reach, a few inches from his boots. He looks down and over his shoulder, the pavement familiar due to the line of deep cracks he remembers forming two years ago after a harsh winter left them with an ice storm. Riku’s legs are half tangled with his own and Kairi is beside him, her face saved from an unfortunate meeting with the asphalt thanks to the small amount of height she gains due to being sprawled across Riku’s back.

Kairi shakes her head, trying to focus her gaze. She looks up and sees the diner. “What,” she starts, the only emotion in her voice a resounding flatness due to shock, “the fuck.”

Riku turns his head towards the pavement, dazed eyes realizing where they are. He looks to sky. “It’s getting late.”

The other two look up. The sun has already started its descent in the west. It won’t be long until the sky changes colors with sunset.

“Good thing we landed here then,” Sora says, forcing his bone-tired body to stand. “I’m starvi- hey, you guys aren’t covered in that goop anymore,” he notes, holding a hand out to help Kairi up.

Kairi sits back on her knees, looking down at the pale pink of her jacket, completely unstained. She shakes her head, even as she lets Sora help her stand. “This- this is all impossible,” she mumbles. It’s giving her a headache just trying to wrap her mind around it.

“Well…” Sora starts before shrugging. “Yeah, but-“

“But nothing, Sora,” Kairi cuts him off, utterly exasperated. “There’s no just switching directions this time. We started on one side of town and now we’re on the other, with the only away across being through it. This isn’t just some bad sense of direction! We were carried here by something that apparently doesn’t even exist anymore! This isn’t just some freaky town stuff anymore, this is- it’s-“

“Insane?” Sora offers, quirking an eyebrow and grabbing the sides of her arms. He moves his hands up and down, trying to calm her panic a bit. “Believe me, I’ve noticed. What about you, Ri- Riku?” His voice drops off as he catches sight of Riku, now sitting up but remaining cross-legged on the ground. His head is in his hands, his hat discarded next to him. “Hey…” he trails, slowly letting his hands fall away from Kairi as he moves towards his other friend. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Riku grunts, lifting his face from his hands. Somehow, Sora thinks he looks more tired than the rest of them. “Just wish I had some aspirin.”

“Maybe some food will help,” Kairi suggests, standing in front of Riku and pocketing her wrench so she can offer him both her hands. “We’re here anyways, so we might as well, right?”

He looks up at her skeptically. “I don’t know about you two, but a wallet wasn’t exactly high on my list of things to bring.”

Kairi rolls her eyes and waves him off. “That’s what tabs are for, dummy. C’mon, let’s just get a little bit of normalcy for a minute. I feel like I haven’t had that in years.”

Riku can’t argue with that. He takes her hands and lets her pull him up, unable to suppress a chuckle at the strain from lifting his weight that’s clearly showing on her face.

“Lose some weight, will ya?” she huffs, hands on her hips.

Riku continues laughing as he picks up the axe that (thankfully) landed a little bit away from them. “Can’t,” he smirks at her, propping the weapon on his shoulder. “It’s all muscle.”

Kairi sticks her tongue out him, eyes flicking over to Sora. He definitely didn’t miss that comment. “Come on, come on,” she urges, walking backwards towards the diner. “Let’s get some real food, I haven’t eaten since yesterday morning.”

That statement makes both boys frown, but they don’t push her. The reasoning is fairly easy to figure out.

“Stella!” Kairi cheers in relief as soon as she walks in, the same waitress as always looking up at the call of her name.

The waitress chuckles. “Well, don’t you three look hungry. Work up an appetite today?”

Kairi nods. “We need burgers, stat! Plus… the usual,” she adds with an embarrassed smile.

“Apple cider,” Riku interrupts, voice haggard. “Hot.”

Stella nods, motioning for them to take a seat. “That I can make happen. I’ll get your orders out to you as soon as I can.”

They’re not sure what exactly brings about the nonchalance, but they don’t bother trying to hide their weapons or how exhausted they are. Riku near collapses into the booth, his axe loudly clattering against the table top when he lays it across the surface near the window. Kairi follows suit, sliding in next to Riku and leaning against his shoulder, spinning the wrench in front of her on the table. Sora sits across from them, scooting the hockey stick behind him and letting the blade hang off the bench.

They stay quiet as they wait, the relief of just getting to sit down and rest too overwhelming to bother with idle chatter. It isn’t until the waitress comes out with their drinks a few minutes later that they speak, letting out tired thank you’s as they refuel with steaming mugs of sugary goodness.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you kids look this worn out,” Stella comments, looking them over with concern. “You weren’t getting into any trouble, were you?”

“Just helping Sora reroof the house,” Riku lies easily, feeding her the same excuse he gave his parents. “That blizzard really didn’t do the old thing any favors.”

Stella laughs, nodding in understanding. “That’ll do it, then. Let me go check on your burgers, you kids must be starved.” She leaves again, disappearing into the back.

“So…” Sora starts, looking at the hot chocolate in his mug. He likes the kind they keep for Kairi at the house better. “What’s our next move?”

“Honestly? I don’t know,” Riku admits, staring out the window and into the woods that just spit them out. “Sure, I expected some weird shit to be out there, but…” He shakes his head and his skull throbs with the movement. “This has definitely surpassed all expectations.”

There’s not much else they can say to that, not when they both agree.

The minutes pass in more silence, only their occasional sipping bringing noise into the atmosphere. Riku leans his head against the glass, watching the sky through the window. The colors change rapidly, the blue giving way to reds and oranges as twilight officially descends upon them.

Riku stiffens for a second, eyes growing distant as he focuses on something that isn’t there.

“Riku…?” Kairi calls softly, watching him with a strange expression.

He closes his eyes, blocking everything else out for a moment.

Sora looks between his two friends, confusion clear on his face.

“Riku,” Kairi repeats, lowering her voice further still. “Is it… _the train_?” she whispers, terrified of being overheard.

Sora’s eyes widen, going back to focus solely on Riku. “You can hear it right now?” He looks out the window. Yeah, the time seems right for it. It’s bizarre, though, even after experiencing it once today, how Riku can hear things they can’t.

“It… stopped,” Riku says slowly, his face screwing together.

“What?” Kairi blinks, not sure she heard him right.

“It stopped,” he repeats and a handful of seconds pass by before he speaks again. His eyes flutter open, like he’s emerging from a trance. “And now it’s gone again.”

“What do you mean it stopped?” Kairi presses, leaning forward on the table so she can get a good look at Riku’s face.

He shakes his head and sighs. “I mean exactly what I said. It’s been doing that lately. It comes by and then sometimes it just… stops. Not for long, maybe a minute at most, and then it leaves again. It doesn’t usually stop in the daytime, though,” he mumbles.

“So in the morning, when it’s still dark out,” Sora starts excitedly, an idea forming, “that’s when it usually stops?”

“Yeah…” Riku says slowly, wary. “Why-“ As soon as he says it, he catches on.

Sora grins, knowing they’re on the same page. “Let’s go tonight.”

“Aren’t you tired?” Kairi whines, laying her head on the table, ignoring the wrench pressing into her cheek.

Sora rolls his eyes, smiling. “We go tonight, out by the clearing again. We try to the catch the-“ he lowers his voice, “ _the train_. Even if it doesn’t stop again, there has to be _some_ reason that it comes. Maybe even the woods will be different.”

Riku nods along with the idea. “It’s not a bad plan. Better than anything else we’ve been doing.”

“Better is strong word,” Kairi mumbles.

“We can meet back up at Sora’s tonight. Kai, you’ll have to spend the night,” Riku says and Kairi suddenly thinks it’s best idea they’ve had all day. “We can rest for a bit, set an alarm a before it usually comes, and get out there to wait for-“

The waitress suddenly appears, three plates on a tray that she places in front of them, the porcelain dishes clattering ungracefully against the table. It jolts them from their conversation, all three of them frozen on edge as they eye Stella cautiously.

Their blood runs cold.

It’s the same waitress all right, but it’s certainly not Stella. Sora feels dread pool in his stomach at the sight of her expression – her eyes are crinkled until they’re nearly closed, her lips stretched too far, too tight, to be a true smile.

“I know you kids aren’t talking about the train, right?” she says in voice pitched too high, her expression unfaltering.

Riku head throbs painfully and he thinks he might be sick.

“Don’t go into the woods,” she says cheerfully but it feels like a warning. Or a threat. “You might be found.” She walks away, going back behind the counter and beyond the swinging door to the kitchen.

Without a word the trio snatch up their weapons and the burgers from their plates and leave.

 

~ ~ ~

 

Kairi sits on the closed toilet lid, fidgeting while Riku puts a new bandage over her cut, one that will hopefully stay better. Sora leans on the doorframe to the bathroom, chewing the inside of his cheek while he watches Kairi drum her fingers on her knees. It’s not normal. She isn’t one to get twitchy like this.

“So…” Sora begins slowly. “What did you end up telling him?”

Kairi’s fingers immediately stop drumming, instead curling into tight fists. She takes a deep breath and lets it out as a long sigh. “I told him I was sleeping over at Selphie’s house,” she confesses, eyes downcast. “He said “sure, fine.” It was like I was telling him what I was gonna make for dinner.” She sinks her teeth into her quivering lip. She won’t cry about this anymore, she refuses. They have more important things to worry about right now. “Honestly… I don’t think he’ll notice if I just… don’t come home anymore.”

“Well that’s morbid,” Riku comments, pulling away after smoothing the tape down.

Kairi twist her lips and smacks the side of his thigh. “Not like that, you moron. I mean like you, like if I just… stay here with you guys…” she trails sheepishly. “If that’s alright with you, I mean.”

“Pfft, of course it’s fine, Kai!” Sora grins. His expression falters after a second, though. “My, uh… I haven’t… I don’t think my parents have come home since the, uh, incident. At the post office,” he stammers out ineloquently. “They haven’t even yelled at me for not finishing the mail this morning, so I don’t think they’ll be coming home any time soon. So, uh, if you want to use their room, that’s fine. Or you could try to snuggle in with us in my bed, like when we were kids, but it’s kinda running out of room, ha ha…”

“You didn’t tell me that,” Riku frowns, expression serious.

Sora rolls his eyes. “Well it’s only a queen bed, Ri, it’s not like-“

His frown turns into a scowl. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

Sora turns away, looking at his friends from the corner of his eye. “It didn’t seem important, you know? Figured you guys would just, I dunno, notice? If enough time went by.” He shrugs. “Look, I’m trying really hard to not freak out about all this stuff, but it’s… it’s freaky.”

He jolts when Kairi is suddenly pressed against him, arms around his waist in a tight hug. “It’s freaky,” she nods in agreement. “But we’re here to stick together. Even if the whole town goes weird on us, we’ll definitely still have each other.”

Sora smiles at her softly, returning the embrace. “Yeah, definitely.” He looks up at Riku, grinning wider and holding his arms open. “Come on, you know you wanna join in,” he teases, motioning with his hands for Riku to come over.

“Do I now?” Riku mumbles, a small smile quirking the corner of his lips. He tries to scoot past them to make it into the hallway, but Sora and Kairi’s arms shoot out to grab him, pulling him into their group hug. He wraps his arms around their shoulders in defeat, knowing he won’t be let go until he hugs back. “Now,” he says pointedly, pulling away despite them trying to keep a hold on him, “we should really go to sleep. The train is only a handful of hours away.”

“Fine,” Kairi sighs, moving away to head down the stairs to the other bedroom. “Be sure to wake me up right when the alarm goes off.”

“Got it,” Riku nods, going to Sora’s room with the brunette following. He looks around the room, lips pressed into a thin line. “You got a flashlight around here?”

Sora purses his lips in thought before letting out a knowing hum. He goes to his dresser, pulling open the bottom drawer and digging through the assortment of random objects shoved inside. It takes a minute, but eventually he pulls out a hefty flashlight, flicking it on and off to make sure the bright bulb inside is still good. “We’re not really gonna be able to fight anything if we have to hold a flashlight and weapon,” Sora points out as Riku takes the torch from his hand.

Riku weighs it in his grip and nods. “That’s fine. I won’t be bringing my axe, anyways.”

“Wait, what?” he spins around to look Riku in shock and confusion, his jaw slack. “That’s the best weapon we have between the three of us!”

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Riku picks up the axe from his bag and holds it up so Sora can see. He presses his palm to the blade’s edge.

Sora jolts, lurching forward. “Hey-“

Riku pulls his hand away to show him. There’s an indent across his palm from the pressure of pressing it to the blade, but nothing else. No cut, no blood. “I don’t know why its dulled so fast, but it has. And I didn’t bother to bring a whetstone because I didn’t think I’d need it. I’ll go over to my house tomorrow to grab one, but for tonight… it’s fine. I’ve got another idea in mind, anyways.”

Sora frowns. He isn’t sure this is such a good idea, but… “Whatever you say, Ri,” he sighs, shutting the dresser drawer. He tugs off his sweatshirt and lets Riku get under the covers before he does as well.

 

~ ~ ~

 

It’s freezing outside at 3am. It’s freezing outside, but Kairi is sure the amount that she’s shivering isn’t entirely because of the outside weather. They’ve already been waiting by the tracks for half an hour and the six hours of sleep they managed to get wasn’t enough rest to be worth dealing with this. Not for her, at least.

“Do you hear it yet, Riku?” Sora asks past a yawn for the seventeenth time since they’ve come out here.

Riku is done explaining that it doesn’t work like that. “No,” he says bluntly. Something feels wrong.

More time passes. A light flurry of snow blows through town. Kairi mentally curses the concepts of both ice and cold.

“Ri-ku,” Sora whines. He knows it was his idea, but he would have rather slept in later if he knew the entire thing would be a bust.

Kairi narrows her eyes, focusing on Riku when he doesn’t immediately respond to Sora for, amazingly, the first time so far. “Riku?” she calls, walking over to him. There’s a curious expression on his face, some cross between alarm and confusion. “Riku, what’s wrong?”

“It’s not coming,” he finally answers, brows pulling down further when he says it.

Sora sighs, “Well, you said it doesn’t come sometimes, right?”

“The sunset train is the only one that misses days,” Riku clarifies.

Sora shrugs. “Well, maybe it’s just having an off day. You know, _literally_. Maybe it _has_ missed the mornings before and you just never-“

“I have been hearing this stupid train for over three months, Sora,” Riku barks out, clearly frustrated. “It has never missed the morning.”

Sora’s face falls as he shakes his head back and forth. “Three- That can’t be right, you said you started hearing it a couple weeks before the nightmares started, right? That would mean you’ve been-“ He stops himself when his eyes meet Riku’s and it’s clear as day, just how thin he really is stretched, just how exhausted he really is. But there’s a truth to that that hits Sora like something else entirely, the taste of betrayal bitter on his tongue. “You said you’d only been having the dreams for a few days,” Sora states, voice blank.

A chill runs down Kairi’s spine and she knows that, for once, it has nothing to do with being cold.

Riku averts his eyes. “What difference does it make? Three days, three months – knowing would have led us to the same place regardless.”

“It does make a difference, you idiot!” Sora yells and his voice resounds like a thunderous echo through the clearing. He stomps over to Riku, grabbing his arm and forcing him to turn, to face him. He fists his hands in the front of his jacket, anger running through him until his skin feels hot. “You’ve been suffering on your own for three months! We’re your friends; how are we supposed to help you when you won’t tell us when shit is wrong?!”

Riku narrows his eyes, mouth curling into a sneer. “I didn’t want your help,” he says easily, voice flat. “I don’t _need_ your help. I’ve been doing just fine with all this bullshit in my head so far. You guys shouldn’t even be involved in this.”

There’s a sting at Sora’s eyes, but he bites it back. His fury is far more powerful right now than any pain could be. “Then why did you involve us?!” he screams in Riku’s face, jaw aching from how tense he is.

“I don’t _know_!” he screams back. He grabs Sora’s wrists and tears them from his jacket. “But I know now that I sure as hell _shouldn’t have!_ ” He steps back from them, closer to the forest.

“Riku-“ Kairi tries to call after him, voice catching when he turns his back on her.

“Go home, Kairi,” he says lowly, not interested in a debate. He flicks on the flashlight with his left hand and reaches into his pocket with the right, taking out his trusty pocketknife and pulling the blade out with his teeth. He slashes out against the first tree he reaches, the knife tearing through the bark easily. “Both of you – just leave.” He doesn’t turn to see if they listen. He walks into the forest, the shadows easily swallowing him into the night.

“Sora,” Kairi urges, shaking his shoulder. “We can’t let him go in there by himself. If it’s like before, alone he won’t-“

“I know,” Sora breathes. And he does know. He knows but his hands are still clenched into hard fists, his body is still trembling from the overwhelming strength of his emotions. “Just,” he grits out, screwing his eyes shut. “Just give me a minute.”

Kairi nods and takes a step back, giving him space. She only now notices that it’s started to snow harder.

The ground is covered in a layer of snow, one they both know shouldn’t be there yet, one they know is related to the same thing everything else is. Riku could be caught in another sudden blizzard soon, out there in the woods. Alone.

Sora opens his eyes and yells before he drops to his knees, shoving his face into the icy snow.

“Sora!” Kairi gasps, grabbing the back of his jacket and yanking him back up.

Sora’s face is red from the cold and he sniffles, shaking his head rapidly before wiping the wet off his face with his gloves. “Okay,” he breathes, nodding to himself before turning to offer Kairi a smile that’s only slightly forced. “I’m cooled off now.”

Kairi scowls, hitting his shoulder for the bad pun but is immensely relieved he’s back to normal. “Come on,” she motions to the woods with her chin and tosses Sora his hockey stick from the ground. “We’ve got a dumbass to find.”

He nods again and they run into the woods. It doesn’t take long to figure out what Riku is doing, the slash from the first tree being replicated every few feet. He’s marking his path and it gives Sora and Kairi an easy method to follow him.

It takes a little while. Riku moves fast when he’s alone, apparently. It takes a while, but the second they see a white light in the distance they sprint towards it.

“Riku!” Kairi yells as hard as she can, desperate not to let her voice get swallowed by the wind. “Riku-“

The light turns towards them, blinding them.

“Riku, it’s us!” Sora shouts, a hand moving up to shield his eyes. “Put that down!”

He seems to listen, the light lowering just enough to not be shining directly in their faces.

Sora breathes a sigh a relief. Maybe Riku has cooled down, too. “Riku, I’m-“ The words catch in his throat when gets a glimpse of Riku’s face.

Teeth gritted, jaw tight, eyes twitching from a wince to a flinch. He’s in a pain, a lot of it if he’s having that visible of a reaction.

“Riku?” Sora breathes. As soon as the word leaves his mouth Riku takes off, sprinting off in a different direction from the one he’d been going. “Riku!” he yells and they both start chasing after him determined not to lose him again.

The light bobs and bleeds along the trees ahead of them, shaking violent and unsteady as Riku runs. It’s disorienting to look at but it’s the only thing they have to follow. Even as Riku arm whips out at random to mark the trees he’s running past, Sora and Kairi know if they slow down they’ll lose him. Somehow, they know it will be for good.

“Riku!” they continue to yell after him. The name burns as it leaves their lungs, turning into white mist in the air as soon as it’s spoken. They don’t stop yelling.

They only stop when he does. The suddenly still light emanating from their friend’s hand shouldn’t be as foreboding as it is.

They’re both panting and it feels like their rib cages might collapse at this rate.

Kairi moves her mouth to call out for him one last time. “Ri-“ She holds her breath when he raises the hand holding the knife, one finger raising to tell her to stop.

“Wait,” he whispers, voice ragged. “I hear somethi- _AAH_!” Riku stumbles backwards, the knife falling from his hand. He presses his now free hand to his forehead, his back colliding with a tree.

“Riku!” Kairi shouts in a panic, adrenaline pumping through her again as she jumps over overgrown tree roots, trying to reach him.

Sora’s starts to follow, already moving two steps forward when he starts to speak. “Riku, are you-“

“ _Look out!_ ”

Sora moves on instinct at the sound of Riku’s voice, whipping his hockey stick around and feeling the impact of it making contact with something before he sees it. It’s much softer than a tree, much larger than a badger. The hit only lasts for half a moment, though, before the piece of wood snaps in two from the weight against it. He spins around, eyes darting all over. There’s no sign of whatever he hit anywhere, no matter where he looks.

“Riku, Riku, are you okay?” Kairi asks, trying not to hyperventilate as soon as she reaches him. Her hands grasp his shoulders, holding him up as she tries to get a good look at him. She needs to see what the damage is, she needs to know what’s hurting him.

He tries to push her away. “I’m fine, I’m-“ His teeth grind against each harshly at the jolt of pain shooting through his temples. His lips twist into grimace that sharpens into a snarl as the sensation turns from a burning stabbing pain to a molten bolt of lightning that travels straight through the top of his head down to the base of his spine.

He drops the flashlight as his legs give out and he’s sent crashing to the ground. Both hands fist tightly in his hair and he presses his forehead through the snow until it touches the cool forest soil. The pain hones itself until it’s a perfect point of pure blinding agony, piercing through his entire body. He thinks he might be screaming with the way it feels like a thousand tiny claws are tearing his throat to shreds, but it sounds too far away, too vicious, to be his. To be human.

“Sora!” Kairi cries over the sound of Riku screeching, but Sora is frozen in place. He’s terrified. For the first time in his life, he’s feeling what pure unadultered terror feels like. He thinks he might be sick.

Something in the back of Riku’s mind spurs to life with a foggy sense of familiarity, like he’s felt this exact pain before. He thinks he would remember if he had. He thinks his head might explode, but he doesn’t know if it will happen before all the veins in his body rupture. He feels like he’s on fire, like flames are licking at his bones instead of his skin. He wonders if it’s enough to melt all the snow around them.

“ _Sora!_ ” Kairi screams as loud as she can, on the verge of tears. She can’t carry him back by herself. “ _Help me_ , we need to get him out of here!”

Sora shatters out of whatever trance he’s in, dropping the broken hockey stick and sprinting towards Riku. He shoves the flashlight into Kairi’s hands, his own hands going to Riku’s back. “Riku, you need to talk to us. You need to tell us what’s wrong. Can you stand?”

Riku lets out a gasping sob in response and Sora feels it like a knife through his chest.

“Okay, okay,” he mutters to himself, looking around. He can’t see it when he tries to look at it directly, but there’s… _something_ moving, closing in on them, wriggling in his peripherals. “Kai, you need to lead the way back,” Sora instructs as he tries to push Riku’s body upwards so he can get a better grip on him. “You’ve got our backs, right? You might need to fend for us.”

Kairi nods and whips her head around, looking for the markings Riku left to lead them here.

They’re gone.

“Sora,” Kairi calls, her panic turning into something much calmer as her mind races.

“Riku, I’m gonna try to carry you as much as I can, but I’m gonna need you to help me stand up, okay?” he says as evenly as he can despite the way his entire body is shaking.

Riku nods and he’s able to get his trembling legs back under him again as Sora helps him up, grunting under his weight.

“ _Sora_ ,” Kairi says again, more urgent. Sora looks at her as he hefts one of Riku’s arms over his shoulders, trying to carry as much of his weight as he can. “The marks are gone.”

Sora’s eyes dart around the forest to confirm her words and he feels his heart sink to the pit of his stomach when he does. “Then- Then we just need to move forward.”

Kairi nods and they start moving, going slow as Riku’s feet drag in the snow behind them. The shadows are growing closer. Even with her wrench raised, ready to attack, and the flashlight seemingly scaring away the ones it lands on, they scurry closer whenever they aren’t being watched.

Riku is able to get his feet to somewhat cooperate, limping along with Sora’s steps and letting their pace pick up a little.

It’s nowhere near enough.

Sora isn’t sure what compels him to do. Adrenaline, fear, panic – likely a mixture of all three. He regrets it immediately.

“ _Stay back!_ ” Sora screams at the shadows, at the yellows orbs reflecting off the snow and inching closer towards them.

The forest swallows his voice, twisting and warping it before it spits it back out.

_“Fou…nd… yo…u…”_

Sora freezes. Terror pulses through his veins like its replaced the blood in them entirely.

It’s his voice, but it’s… not.

The warped voice laughs in glee, giggling hysterically as it echoes around them, the voice cracking and collapsing in on itself but still continuing in a distorted mockery of a chant. _“We fo-und y...ou, w-e f-OU-nd… yo-u, we f…ou-nd y-O… U!”_

For a brief moment, Sora wonders if this is what Riku’s nightmares are like. If it is, then maybe he gets why he didn’t want to talk about it.

“I’m sorry.”

Sora’s head snaps down to Riku. “What?”

Riku smiles and it hurts so much to do. “I’m sorry.” He takes a deep breath, straightening a spine that barely feels attached to his body. “We’re gonna have to run.”

Sora gapes as stares Riku who’s now pulling himself out of his grip, trying to stand on his own. “What are you talking about?” he whisper yells at him, his throat raw. “You can’t run!”

Riku grunts and pulls away entirely, swaying on his feet. “I can,” he grits out, his eyes bloodshot when they meet Sora’s. “We have to run. Now.”

Kairi screams, dropping the flashlight so she can grip the wrench with both hands as she slams it with her full body weight into the gleaming shadow that leaps at her. It dissipates like smoke when she hits it.

Sora lunges for the flashlight, barely able to grab it before he’s being yanked back up.

“ _Run!_ ” Riku commands, shoving them both forward and forcing them into a sprint.

_“R-un… rU-n… RU…UN a-w-AY…” the voice cackles._

It’s too close, it’s always too close, always hovering right over their shoulder so it can whisper in their ears.

_“We fo-UnD y…OU… wE’ll fi-ind yo-U… w-e will…ll al-wa-ays fi…nd yo…u…”_

They break through the trees and aren’t surprised to find they aren’t at the clearing.

“Riku!” Kairi yells in distress.

Sora turns his head to see Riku collapsed completely in the snow, unmoving.

There’s no more voices. There’s no shadows around them. The snow fall is light, a gentle dusting that flutters on the wind.

“Sora, he’s not waking up,” Kairi breathes. The adrenaline is starting to leave her body. She feels like a shell, filled with nothing more than exhaustion and panic.

He looks around, trying to get his bearings. “I… I know where we are,” he voices to his own surprise. Kairi’s expression clearly means the same. “This isn’t… this isn’t far from my house, just a little north of it.” He crawls over to Kairi and starts propping Riku’s body up again. It’s even heavier now that it’s dead weight. “I’m gonna need your help, Kai.”

She nods, shoving the wrench in her pocket and grabbing the flashlight from Sora to do the same. She uses her shoulders to hold Riku up, letting Sora get one of the limp arms around him along with most of the weight before she pulls the other arm over her neck.

The walk is long. They’re exhausted. They don’t know how they keep moving, but they do, step after unending step as they trudge through the snow, practically dragging Riku behind them. The sun is rising when they finally reach the house, dawn at this point a cruel joke to their weary souls.

They aren’t sure how they manage to get up the stairs, but they do. They get to the bedroom and get Riku on the bed, rolling his body to the center of it. They don’t bother undressing. They don’t even take off their boots. Sora climbs over Riku’s body, wrapping one of his arms around him as he squeezes himself between the body and the wall. Kairi isn’t far behind, taking Riku’s other side and doing the same. With one hand they keep hold of Riku’s own, their other arms thrown over his torso. There’s a warmth around them, despite the cold.

They sleep.


	8. Chapter 8

Sora wakes up in cold sweat, disorientated. His heart feels like it’s going to beat straight out of his chest, his lungs pumping oxygen in and out of his body so quickly he’s worried he might never catch his breath again. His head is pounding so hard he’s near certain it’s because someone is drumming a sledgehammer against it.

It feels like everything is spinning, like he’s not in control of his own body. His skin feels wrong, too tight over his bones. He feels sick.

He blinks.

He’s in his room. Everything is still, upright. His body feels fine, nothing out of the ordinary aside from the sheen of sweat coating him.

He looks around. Kairi isn’t in bed anymore, but Riku is still asleep beside him.

“Sora?” Kairi peers inside the room, hanging onto the door frame. “Are you okay? I thought I heard a yell or something…”

“Di- did I?” he asks. He honestly doesn’t remember. He doesn’t remember… anything, really. Not since they passed out last night. He looks out the window, the sky navy and littered with pinpricks of light.

“We slept all day,” Kairi answers before he can ask. “I only woke up a little bit ago myself.” She looks at Riku and frowns, walking into the room and sitting on the edge of the bed. “You two had some weird looks on your faces while you were sleeping. Almost… like you were in pain.” She brushes the hair off Riku’s face, tucking the longer strands behind his ear. “Were you dreaming?”

“Huh…” Sora mumbles, watching Riku’s face. He twitches occasionally, but otherwise he looks relatively peaceful. “Don’t remember.” He shakes his head. He can’t even remember why he woke up or what he was so terrified of.

Kairi frowns, looking between the two boys. “Well, let’s not wake him,” she says softly, gaining Sora’s attention. “He… he needs the rest.”

Sora nods, “Right…”

“Come on,” she tilts her head towards the door. “I made some dinner. Should still be warm.”

Sora’s stomach growls loudly before he has the chance to respond. “Guess that settles it,” he laughs. He crawls off the bed, following Kairi out to the hall. He looks at Riku one more time before pulling the door closed.

Time marches on.

Two days pass.

Two days pass and Riku has barely moved at all, let alone woken up.

Sora isn’t worried. Worried was how he felt when he woke up the first morning. Worried was what followed him and Kairi down the stairs as they made breakfast and dinner in a silent house, unsure of what to do with the day now that they had no required responsibilities to take care of.

Sora isn’t even sure if this counts as panicked because he feels so _so_ beyond that.

“What if he doesn’t wake up,” he finally voices in the middle of the night, the sentiment loud and foreboding in the surrounding quiet.

Kairi sits up and looks over at him. They’re still squeezing together on a bed that’s far too small for three people, but no one complains. Neither give voice to the thought, to the fear, that if they don’t Riku will be gone when they wake.

“He’s going to wake up, Sora,” Kairi says defiantly, like she’s challenging the universe itself. She folds an arm on top of the sturdy chest next to her, settling her chin over her wrist. She rises and falls with his steady breathing. “He’s going to wake up,” she repeats, because it’s the only thing she can do. “And if you don’t stop it with that talk, I’m gonna tell him that you thought he was weak when he wakes up.”

Sora jolts upright and gives her a look of overexaggerated offense. “You wouldn’t,” he whispers.

She smirks, “Try me.” She slides down Riku’s side, snuggling herself into the crook of his shoulder. Even like this, he’s still warmer than her. “Get some sleep. He’ll probably be awake in the morning.”

He knows it’s just an excuse, just something to make him feel better, but he takes comfort in the words regardless. He closes his eyes and waits for morning.

The sun rises.

The sun rises and ascends higher into the sky. Sora and Kairi wake up. Riku doesn’t.

They’re starting to get restless.

“Let’s… let’s go to the grocery store,” Kairi suggests, closing the empty fridge. “There’s barely any food left here. We can go get some stuff and make a… a really good meal for when Riku wakes up.”

She’s trying to stay positive, Sora knows that, but the reminder that he’s not awake yet hurts. Still, doing anything with their day that isn’t just sitting downstairs and playing old board games that aren’t much fun when there’s only two people sounds like a good idea to him. A change of pace, a change of scenery – at this point he’s willing to sulk in the post office for the rest of the day if it helps distract him even a little bit.

“Alright,” he nods. He tries to smile but it looks more like a grimace than anything. He follows her out the front door, forcing himself not to look back.

 

~ ~ ~

 

It’s with a gasp and a jolt that Riku wakes up, the breath punching through his lungs like the first swallow of air after the breaking surface when swimming up from the bottom of the sea. It feels like someone has both fists wrapped around his ribs, pushing down until they concave under the weight and threaten to puncture his lungs then forcing them outwards in an attempt to snap them clean from the cage.

He closes his eyes. He knows how to deal with this.

Controlling his breathing, he fills his lungs to bursting before letting them deflate on a steady exhale that whistles through his grinding teeth. He opens his eyes and he’s fine again. There’s no pain.

He sits up with a jaw cracking yawn, rubbing the sleep from his eyes before he even tries to squint out the window. It’s definitely daytime and the brightness from the sun is unwelcome this soon after waking. He cracks his neck, lifting his arms to stretch out his too stiff body, twisting his torso along with his spine as he looks back at the nightstand for the clock.

12:41pm. He never sleeps in this late.

He pushes up the left sleeve of his shirt, scratching at his wrist for a minute before he notices it. The dark heart shaped mark he’s had for as long he remembers. Unchanging for as long as he remembers.

It’s growing.

It’s stretching out like tendrils, thin spidery veins of purple and black extending outwards and shifting the heart into some amorphous blob instead. He pulls his hand away, pushing the sleeve up to his elbow, desperate to find out how far it goes.

There’s a sigh of relief when he realizes it doesn’t go far. It’s still mostly contained to the same area as before, just a little wider in all directions and starting to stretch around to the outside of his wrist. He yanks the sleeve back down. He doesn’t want to worry about this right now.

He rubs at his eyes again, the heel of his hand pressing against his cheek. He flinches on instinct before he realizes it doesn’t hurt.

He stumbles out of bed, legs weak and wobbly beneath him. Using the walls for balance, he staggers to the bathroom, fumbling for the light switch as he leans in close to the mirror.

It’s gone. There’s no more lump, no discoloring covering half of his face, not even a cut. He winces as he pulls off the dirty butterfly closures, the adhesive pulling painfully at his skin until it releases. He presses at the smooth skin, making sure he isn’t just seeing things.

A thin pale line, barely noticeable against his already pale skin, is all that remains.

The front door opens, Kairi stepping through first while Sora follows and kicks the door shut. They head to the kitchen, setting the near overflowing paper bags in their arms down on the table, ready to unpack.

Riku studies the healed flesh in the mirror, poking and prodding it as much as he can. He tilts his head to a new angle and that’s when catches sight of his eyes in the mirror, gaze locking with the reflection’s. For a moment, the eyes aren’t his. For a moment, one reflects a piercing blue that seems familiar though he knows he’s never seen it before.

_“Find where I reside.”_

His knees give out and he collapses into a heap on the ground.

Sora and Kairi’s heads whip around to origin of the loud thump. They exchange a look before racing up the stairs.

_“Do not be fool enough to reject my gift.”_

“Riku!” Sora yells as he peels down the hallway. His heart hammers in his chest as he finds the bedroom empty, but it only takes half a second to notice the light pouring into the hallway further down. He runs and drops to his knees when finds Riku huddled on the floor of the bathroom, clutching at his head. “Riku,” Sora breathes, half in fear half in relief. “What’s wrong?”

Riku groans in answer.

“Come on, Ri,” Sora urges, hesitantly touching his arms. “You gotta tell us what’s wrong.”

“My- head,” he gasps out, the words mixed in with a sob.

Well, he had figured that much out. “What’s causing it?” Sora tries. “Is there anything we can do to stop it?”

“I don’t _know_ ,” Riku grits out, fingers curling against his hair. His skin feels overripe and fit to split. His palms push pressure against it, holding in the pieces of his crumbling skull.

Kairi crouches down behind Sora, holding onto his shoulder so she can look past him. “What do we do?” she whispers. This obviously isn’t a problem they can solve with bandages.

Riku’s head snaps up, eyes wide and a little unearthly. “The graveyard,” he whispers. With that admission the pain recedes, only leaving a deep exhaustion in its wake. He pitches forward, his head meeting Sora’s chest while his brain warns him that he’s close to losing himself to unconsciousness again.

Sora’s hold on Riku is tight, protective and secure. “What about the graveyard?” he asks gently. His fingers comb through Riku’s hair, the same motion he remembers his mother doing when he was younger and needed comfort.

Riku’s arms fall limply to ground and Kairi doesn’t hesitate to grab his hand. “Take your time, Riku. We’re right here.”

He gives a slight nod and listens, breathing through the lingering cover of phantom pain fogging his brain. It takes a minute but even when his head clears up he doesn’t move, indulging himself and secretly savoring the feeling of an arm around him and fingers in his hair. “I need… I need to get to the graveyard.”

“No way,” Kairi immediately denies him. Her grip on his hand grows stronger.

He sighs and pulls back, looking at the two in front of him. “I need to go.”

“Why? What’s there?” she continues, crossing her arms.

He furrows his brows. “I-“ What _is_ there? “I don’t know, but-“ He grunts, discomfort pulsing in his head that threatens to turn into something worse. “All I know is that there’s _something_ there. I need to find it.”

“Then we’ll go get it for you,” Sora cuts in, getting to his feet.

Grabbing the edge of the sink to help himself up, Riku follows. “I-“

“You’ve been unconscious for three days, Riku,” Sora states flatly. It’s something he’s learned from Riku, a tone of voice that people don’t argue with. “You’re not going somewhere for something that can make all,” he gestures to Riku’s face, “ _this_ worse.” He really gets a good look at Riku now, stepping closer and cupping his cheek, running his thumb against it. “Your bruise is gone.”

Riku tenses. He can feel Kairi’s eyes on him. He fights against every instinct telling him to relax and press into the touch. He suddenly comprehends what Sora says. “Three days?” he repeats questioningly, shock clear on his face. He grabs Sora’s wrist, taking a step back so his hand is no longer a distraction. “What do you _mean_ it’s been three days?”

“You wouldn’t wake up, Riku,” Kairi answers placatingly, guilt lingering in her voice. “We tried, but you weren’t even moving. It was…” she trails, eyes firmly focused on the ground. “It was starting to look bad.”

Sora pulls his hand away from Riku, turning away to face Kairi. “Hey,” he murmurs so only the two of them can hear. “You were right. He’s awake now, so now need to be sad, yeah?” She nods, sniffling and squeezing her eyes shut to force back the forming tears. He smiles, giving her arms a gentle squeeze. He looks back over his shoulder. “We’ll go to graveyard. We’ll find whatever you need there. I promise.”

“Okay,” Riku concedes surprisingly easily, guiltily.

Sora grins and it feels right on his face again. “But first, we eat.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

The graveyard isn’t so much an actual graveyard, as much as it’s just called that by the locals. There are no graves to be found in the rolling hills to the west of town nor are there any tombstones to mark the passing of loved ones. What gives the graveyard its name is the expanse of bones littering the small dipping valleys, the skeletal remains becoming one with the surrounding nature and melding with the soil and weeds.

None of the bones are human.

There’s a snapping crunch beneath Kairi’s boot that makes her cringe, her whole body tensing at the pop of feeling. “I hate this place,” she grumbles, sinking into her scarf.

“Yeah, well,” Sora responds, looking around at the piles of sun bleached bones. He’s not even sure what most of these are from. “I’m not much of a fan, either.”

“Where are we even supposed to look?” she asks. The graveyard is huge and sorting through bones isn’t exactly her idea of a good time. “ _What_ are we even supposed to be looking for?” She swears if it’s a skull she’ll scream.

Sora opens his mouth to answer but it snaps shut when he flinches, startled by the sudden cawing from a flock of birds scattering from the hills and taking off into the sky.

“Oh, a murder of crows,” Kairi deadpans, watching them fly away. “That’s lovely and definitely not foreboding at all.” The dark birds blend into the overcast sky, disappearing from view. Thunder roars in the distance, a promise of oncoming weather. “And it’s gonna storm. Isn’t that just _swell_.”

Sora laughs, grabbing her hand and pulling her along. “Then we better find what we need fast-“

A black bird, larger than the crows, lands on the hill in front of them, stopping them in their tracks. It stares directly at them, unmoving, until it squawks loudly. It flaps, hovering in the air for a moment before it heads for another hill and lands on it. it stares at them again.

Kairi furrows her brows. “Should we… follow it?”

Sora nods. “Let’s go.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Riku is a problem solver.

Riku is not the type who likes to wait around in bed, uselessly tossing and turning, while he knows his friends are out there actually doing something to solve the problem. He sits up – frustrated, irritated, aggravated – and stares out the window. The overcast skies are tinging pink. Snow must be coming again.

Riku is a problem solver. And when he can’t solve a problem just by thinking about it, the best thing to do is work through it.

He ditches the bed, looking around for his jacket and boots. If they don’t want him going places that will trigger his migraines, fine. If he looks objectively at all the things that have caused them, as long as he stays away from the forest and anything to do with actually _solving_ the problem then he should be fine. And that’s fine with him. He has other things to do, anyways.

The walk across town is quiet. Part of him thinks it’s just because he’s spent the last week with Sora and Kairi near constantly. The other part of him, though, doesn’t take long to notice that he’s the only one out here. There’s no shop doors opening and closing, no townsfolk chattering as they walk down sidewalks or scurry down the street. Come to think of it, he hasn’t even seen Goofy around lately. The old dog usually shows up to sleep at Sora’s house at least a few times a week.

There’s a bad feeling churning in his gut but he doesn’t dwell on it. He knows it will only get worse once he gets home.

And he’s right. The walk up the hill feels increasingly unfamiliar and when he opens the door and walks inside he feels like he’s in a stranger’s home. His mother looks over at him, giving only a cursory glance before she turns away, uninterested. He tries not to let the sting bother him. This just makes it easier, anyways. He grabs the keys off the counter and goes back outside.

His father is outside now, an axe in his hands coming down to split the firewood Riku is no longer around to chop. His father doesn’t look up as he passes him, moving around to the workshop. He unlocks the doors (the doors are only closed at night, why are they closed now) and swings the doors open, no longer concerned with being quiet like he was a few days ago. Things are different now. He can feel it.

The box of whetstones are right where he left him. He’ll have to remember to grab a few before he leaves. Right now, his eyes are focused on the beams of lumber leaning against the wall. He grabs one and hefts it up on the shaper, grabbing the ski goggles from under the table he started using after his protective glasses broke in an incident involving Sora and a hockey puck. He tucks his face into the high collar of his jacket and turns the machine on.

 

~ ~ ~

 

“Where is this stupid bird leading us?” Kairi grumbles under her breath. They’ve already chased it across half the graveyard and her previous squeamishness at crushing skulls beneath her boots is now just turning to irritation with every unsavory crunch and pop.

“If I knew, we wouldn’t be chasing it,” Sora chuckles, but he’s getting tired of this too. The corvid isn’t landing on hills to wait for them like it was in the beginning, now sailing easily through the growing winds and expecting them to keep pace. He’s getting tired of getting his feet trapped in rib cages.

They huff and pant as they run after it, trying to keep their eyes both on the sky and on the ground at the same time. It isn’t very efficient. They’ve already lost the bird a couple times and tripped down slopes and over bones more than that.

Kairi grows wary as she catches sight of the darkening skies, the pink warning of snow shifting to a more ominous red. The increasingly loud rumbles of thunder don’t ease the feeling. “Sora-“

“Look!” Sora shouts, pointing up ahead. The bird is hovering in the distance, flying circles like a vulture over the hill beneath it.

They pick up their pace, paying attention to the ground now that they know where to go. They skid down into the valleys, stepping over skeletal pyramids bulging out of the dirt, jogging back up the hills and repeating the process until they reach their destination.

The bird isn’t there when they reach it. Not the bird they were following, at least.

Staring down at the bones that surround the hill like a ruler, standing at the apex of the hill like a king, is a raven. Its skeletal remains are in perfect condition, the bones sun-bleached and pearly. It’s sharp beak is open, holding a large blue marble-like object in its grasp.

Sora and Kairi freeze in front of it, caught like deer in the headlights as they stare into abyss its empty sockets offers them. The thunder is above them now, its echoing resonance shaking the ground around them.

The bones rattle. The raven does not move.

Sora reaches out hesitantly, trembling fingers hovering inches away from the beak.

“What are you _doing?!_ ” Kairi hisses between her teeth, looking between Sora’s hand and his face.

“Well, this has to be it, right?” Sora says nervously, eyes wide and panicked smile twitchy.

Kairi looks just as apprehensive. “I don’t know, it looks like it’s probably cursed!” she whispers loudly, voice almost drowned out by the thunder.

Sora starts to chuckle, but it sounds a little unhinged. “Kai, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I think the _whole goddamn town_ is cursed!” he hisses back.

She supposes that’s a good point. “Okay, just-“ she talks a deep breath, trying to calm herself. “Take it quick and let’s get out of here.”

Sora nods and plucks the sphere from the crow’s mouth, the beak letting it go easily. He sighs in relief.

“Hey!”

They both jolt, heads snapping over to where someone stands on a hill in the distance.

“What are you doing over there?”

They recognize the voice. It’s from a man, one of the farmers that lives on the other side of town, the whose property they landed on when they outran the wolves. He shouldn’t be anywhere out here.

“A boneyard ain’t no place for kids to be playing.” His voice is almost cracking under the strain of being so abnormally high-pitched. His crinkled eyes flick down and focus on Sora, his grin growing wider until he’s smiling with his whole face. “What’ve you got there, son?”

The raven’s jaw snaps shut, its stiff bony wings stretching out and flapping until it takes flight and disappears. Sora and Kairi watch in shock, hearts pounding as the bones around them start rattling and moving on their own. They look back up at the farmer, recognizing a faint yellow glow in his eyes that stands out against the ensuing darkness the crimson sky provides.

Sora glances down at the glass orb in his hand. The blues stretch in variant striations outwards from the center where a black mark crosses down the middle like a slit pupil. Like an eye, one that stares straight back at him.

“Sora!” Kairi calls in a panic, snapping him out of his daze. The bone are assembling themselves into grotesque creations, crawling towards them.

Sora shoves the eye into his pocket and grabs Kairi’s wrist. They run, ignoring the sound of laughter and clattering bones behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter has a companion piece - [dig up the bones], third in the vanishing point series.


	9. Chapter 9

Riku stands in the front yard, ignoring the icy flurries starting to coat the ground. His torso twists easily, winding and unwinding in perfect repetition as he swings the newly sanded baseball bat at thin air.

He thought they’d be back already.

He isn’t nervous. He trusts them and the graveyard isn’t in the woods so they should be fine. Safe.

Him swinging a bat in the middle of an oncoming snowstorm has nothing to do with how his antsy body refuses to let him rest while he’s alone. Nothing at all.

“Riku!”

He whips his head towards the sound like a dog being called by its master, but any relief that might have started welling instantly drains when he sees what’s following.

Sora and Kairi are panting as they sprint, a horde of skeletal monstrosities chasing after them. Some pull themselves forward with claws raking the ground, others crude amalgamations of winged creature that seem to have trouble keeping airborne.

“Get inside!” Riku yells, racing towards them.

One of the avian constructs sails towards Sora, diving as it aims for his skull. Sora ducks towards the ground, stumbling but catching himself enough to not lose much speed. Riku stops, feet planted as he swings the bat through the space Sora’s head occupied just a moment ago. The sturdy wood meets brittle bones with a _thwack_ that turns into a cacophony of sickening crunches as the skeleton breaks apart into dozens of lifeless pieces that pelt the creatures behind it like ballistic shrapnel. He squints as a few places fly back towards his face.

“Riku!” Kairi calls, holding the front door open as Sora scrambles inside. Riku slams the bat through the skull of one of the creatures pulling itself across the dirt towards the porch. It writhes and spasms for a short second before falling apart. There’s too many, though, and he can’t get them all right now so he listens to Kairi and bolts into the house so she can lock the door behind him.

“Help me move this,” Sora grits from the living room, trying to shove a bookshelf out of it to barricade the door with. It’s a good call – there’s the sound of skittering scrapes from skeletal remains dragging across the windows, the bleached tips of bones stretching through the gap between the door and the floor. Riku rushes over, grabbing the other side and pulling and then knocking it down to lay on its side against the bottom half of the door.

Sora steps over the books that have scattered across the floor. “We need to find some way to cover the windows. I’m gonna get something to block the back door with.”

“What we do about upstairs?” Kairi asks in a slight panic, eyes darting to the various windows with deep grooves that are being scraped into the glass.

“I-“ Sora looks up from the long side table he’s pushing from the hallway towards the back door. “I don’t know.”

“Your dad never got far with the basement remodeling, right?” Riku asks, much to Sora’s confusion.

“Not really… Why?” Riku slips past Sora, heading towards the back door. “Hey, what are you doing?!”

“You still have the planks out in your shed then,” Riku answers like it’s obvious. He swings the bat in his grip in an easy circle. “I’ll grab them and some tools really quick. Then we can get this place boarded up into a bunker.”

“You just woke up, you’re not going out there,” Sora sputters, leaving the table and heading towards Riku, prepared to stop him if it comes to that. “Those… _things_ are everywhere. Where did you even get that bat?!”

Riku looks from the bat to Sora then back again before sighing. “You’re right, those things are everywhere.”

Sora never likes it when Riku admits he’s right. Good things never follow.

“So _you_ ,” Riku shoves the bat into Sora’s hand and turns back towards the door, “can watch my back.”

“ _Riku_ -“

“And since you’re already yelling at me,” he continues as he turns the deadbolt. “I made the bat while you two were gone.”

“ _Riku_!” Kairi yells from the front, stacking chairs on top of the toppled bookcase. If he wasn’t going to stay put, he might as well have just come with them.

Riku ignores them both as he pulls the door open. “Oh, you might want these.” He fishes the ski goggles out of his jacket pocket and tosses them over his shoulder, Sora fumbling to catch them. “Don’t go blind.”

“I’m not gonna go blind,” Sora grumbles as he tugs the strap over his hair and lets it settle on his nose. He’s had enough debris flying at him today to not want to take the chance.

There’s a soft layer of snow on the ground, one that has managed to settle on everything until the world is coated in a blinding white. It shouldn’t be possible, there was hardly any on the ground before they went inside, but Sora is starting to learn not to question it.

Hands tensing around the base of the bat, Sora’s head snaps towards Riku when he hears a loud crunch. Riku lifts his boot, a smaller necrotic creature crushed into fragments small enough that they hardly look like bones anymore. “I don’t think there’s many around this side, but they’ll probably come,” Riku warns. “They’ll blend in with the snow. Keep an eye out.”

Sora swallows his arguments and nods. He’ll yell at Riku for all of this later.

The shed is a good fifty feet from the back of the house. It’s a good distance usually – not in the way, but not so out of the way that it’s a hassle. Now that distance feels like a minefield and, despite trying to look calm, every step Riku takes is filled with reluctance and maybe even a touch of fear. Not that he’ll admit that.

He hears the sound of the bat crashing into the concrete porch behind him but doesn’t turn around. Sora has a handle on it, he knows he does. Instead, he focuses on getting to the shed as quickly as possible and not tripping over bones that only get partially crushed by his feet.

It’s with a sigh of relief that he yanks the shed door open, the planks leaning up against the back wall just like he remembered when he first helped bring them over. There’s nails inside an old rusted paint can on the makeshift workshop counter and toolbox beside it that he opens up to search for a hammer inside. Tucking the tool head in his pocket and hooking the bucket handle uncomfortably in the crease of his elbow, he heads to the planks. He can’t grab them all, but he shoulders as many as he can without falling over. He hopes it’s enough.

He leaves the shed open as he hurries back to the house, Sora hunched in the doorway and ready to attack. Relief seems to ease his tension for a moment before panic strikes.

“Riku, look out!”

It’s one of the winged ones, its flight pattern janky but with enough momentum that when it swoops down for Riku’s head it sends them both crashing the ground.

“ _Riku_!”

“Sora!” Kairi cries from inside, rushing towards the back. “They’re almost through the windows, they’re- Look out!”

Sora swings the bat around, smashing another set of bones against the side of the house, the chipped off bone fragments bouncing off his face and goggles. “Riku, I’m coming!” he grits out but before he can take a step off the porch there’s more of them coming, rising out of the snow and surrounding them.

Riku feels thin cuts on face and can’t tell if it was teeth, talons, or a strange mixture of both that caused them. He shakes his head and then his limbs, shaking the stragglers off as even more claw their way out from the ground. The nails have fallen out of the bucket and he doesn’t have time to grab them all. He settles for one scoop, dragging the bucket as it fills with some nails and a lot more snow. It’s fine, though, the snow adding enough weight to make the metal pail a viable weapon. He swings it violently, crashing it anything that dares to approach him, before he gets a look at the porch, at Sora and Kairi frantically trying to fight them off.

He’s tired. He’s angry. His head throbs.

Grabbing for the planks and clenching the can handle in his fist, he rises to his feet as he yells. “ _GO!”_

His voice echoes through the forest. It’s louder than he thought it would be and his throat feels raw from the force of it. Everything seems still in that moment.

Sora and Kairi spare him a look but don’t think twice, both falling back into the household.

Riku grunts as he pushes his legs to sprint, ignoring the nightmarish carcasses as he narrows in on the door, crashing to the ground as he falls through it and Sora slams it shut behind him.

“Are you okay?” Kairi breathes, panic lacing her voice. Her hand hovers near Riku’s face where the cuts have started to bleed.

“Fine,” he hisses between gritted teeth, pushing the materials off of him. “Worry about it once we’re safe.”

She nods, grabbing a handful of nails and dragging one of the planks to the front of the house, intent on using her wrench for a hammer.

Sora offers a hand and Riku takes it, immediately grabbing a plank himself and propping it against the door. Sora grabs some nails from the ground and the hammer handle sticking out of Riku’s jacket, nailing the board in place while Riku holds it.

It doesn’t take long, adrenaline working in their favor as they board up the windows on the first floor. There’s only one plank left when they finish and they nail it in place over the window in Sora’s bedroom. Evening begins to set in. They’re exhausted.

“Come on, Riku,” Kairi yawns. She’s grown used to the sound of skittering and scratching over the hours, unfazed as she takes hold of his wrist and drags him to the bathroom to clean up.

“What even were those things?” Sora mumbles, tiredly following them across the hall. “Graveyards are supposed to be for dead things, not… I don’t know, living dead things.”

“Isn’t that exactly what graveyards are for?” Kairi jokes with forced levity. It does little to lighten the mood.

“…Did you find anything there?” Riku asks quietly, eyes downcast as Kairi fusses over him with an alcohol swab.

They both still at the question. Riku has barely spoken since he got inside, singularly focused on making the house as safe for them as possible. Beyond that, they have a feeling he’s been hesitant to ask.

They don’t blame him, but they know he blames himself. Still, this isn’t his fault. He couldn’t have known all of this would happen.

Sora swallows around the lump in his throat and steps closer to the pair. “Here.” He digs into his pocket and pulls out the strangely lustrous orb, handing it to Riku. “This is all we found.”

Riku is cautious as he takes it, an unreadable expression crossing his face as he looks at it. The surface of it is cool against his skin as it rolls around his palm. It stops moving, the snakelike pupil staring straight at him. He makes eye contact and feels himself locked in that moment.

He feels like he’s seen it someplace before.

Time is suddenly fleeting and infinite. A chill moves through his body and down his spine, like someone replaced the vertebrae with shards of ice and shoveled snow around his lungs. He can hear the sound of waves crashing and folding in on themselves, a calming lullaby that’s both distant and nostalgic.

He’s never seen the ocean before. He has no idea what the sea sounds like.

Somehow, he can feel the sensation of silky granules of sands slipping through his fingers.

It feels like home.

“Riku?”

He’s not sure which one of them said his name. One hand closing around the eye, the other fists in his hair as another headache laps at the edges of his mind.

“Riku,” Sora repeats, reaching for his friend.

“Sora?”

They freeze. Any calm they felt after barricading themselves in is gone, blown away by that singular word.

“Sora, honey, are you in there? What’s going on? We can’t get the door unlocked.”

They were naïve to think that they could save themselves, that there was any safety to be had as they remained in town.

Sora’s mouth is painfully dry, his mind and body a million miles apart from each other. “M…Mom…”

“Sora,” Kairi starts comfortingly only to be interrupted by Riku.

“It’s not,” he says firmly, looking up at the brunette. “You know it’s not.”

Sora swallows, glancing at them both. He sprints out of the bathroom and down the stairs.

_“Sora!”_ they yell, scrambling after him.

It’s dark downstairs. The lights are off, the planks have blocked most of the natural light, and the curtains have been drawn over them. The clicking of bones and dragging of talons is still easy to hear.

“Mom…” Sora breathes, walking towards the window left of the front door.

“Sora is that you?” she answers despite his voice being quiet enough that he could barely hear it himself. “Oh, sweetie, can you let us in? We’ve been looking everywhere for you. We were starting to think we’d never find you.”

_“But I was home,”_ he wants to say but the words can’t get past his teeth. _“You were the ones that never came back.”_

“Don’t, Sora,” Kairi pleads in a whisper, stopped from stepping off the bottom stair by Riku’s firm grip around her bicep. She knows why. If they force him back upstairs, he might cause a scene and that in turn might cause something very _very_ bad to happen outside. If they let this continue, though… She knows they might need a head start.

Sora pauses then twitches, a weird stunted flow taking over his movements. He reaches for the curtains, first with both hands then with only one, the other gripping his necklace and allowing it to ground him. He takes a breath and yanks the fabric away from the window.

It’s dark outside. Not evening like it should be, not overcast like the weather has been, but entirely like being dropped into the dead of night in the middle of nowhere.

A pair of yellow eyes stare at him from between the cracks in the boards, glowing brighter than the moonlight. They smile and Sora feels his stomach drop through the basement.

“Good boy.”

Hands break through the glass of the window, forcing their way between the barricade to grab at him. He can hear his name being called from multiple directions and it leaves him dizzy, hardly able to fight against the gnarled hands pulling him against the boards, like they’re trying to drag him out through them.

Pressed against the boards he can see it, a face to match the voice he recognized. “Mom…” he whispers painfully as he sees the smile twist her face into something no longer familiar. There’s something hollow to her now – her eyes and cheeks sunken in, her skin sallow, her body somehow stretched until everything is just slightly too long and inhuman.

He’s not sure when he started crying, but the cold air blowing in from outside freezes the tracks to his face, leaving his cheeks feeling icy and as numb as his chest does.

There’s hands that are warm pulling him in the opposite direction. They aren’t strong enough, not with dozens grabbing a hold of him, fisting in his shirt, jacket, hair. Another joins, squirming it’s way between the others and grabs at his chest, spindly fingers wrapping around his pendant.

There’s a screech, something no human or organic creature could make, like shards of glass scraping against metal. The limbs retreat, one of them oozing a thick cloud of darkness as it pulls away. He falls to the ground on top of the others, but they don’t waste time. The sound of wailing increases until it’s a chorus loud enough to shake the walls and the skeletal chimeras take that as their cue to press through the holes in the broken windows and pour in.

“Up, up, _up_ ,” Riku chants. He’s the first to his feet, yanking Kairi up first and pushing her towards the stairs before he grabs Sora by the back of his jacket, half pulling half dragging him up behind her.

“Where do we go now?” Kairi asks, eyes wide and chest rising and failing rapidly as she nears hyperventilation.

Riku lets go of Sora once he has his feet under him, his own feet leading him to the only place they _can_ go. The other two follow him into the bedroom, watching as he pulls his gloves and hat on and grabs his axe. “Only one place to go,” he answers, his heart hammering against his ribs as the thought forces its way into his head. He turns to look at both of them, his tongue heavy and dry in his mouth. “The train is here.”

**Author's Note:**

> [run, run, run away//a vanishing point playlist](https://8tracks.com/zephyreden/run-run-run-away)
> 
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> 
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